


The Full Circle

by saphsaq



Series: Near-Human [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rise of Empire Era - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Carbonite, Cinnagar, Clones, Colicoids, Colla IV, Coruscant, Darksaber, Empress Teta, Eriadu, F/M, Ferentina, M/M, Mandalorians - Freeform, Naboo - Freeform, Neimoidians, Nightsisters, Yinchorri, noSheev
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-26
Updated: 2015-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-21 10:27:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 21,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/899233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saphsaq/pseuds/saphsaq
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary: How Darth Sidious accepted Darth Maul serving him in public, which subsequently drove Darth Maul and the female trooper through whole of the galaxy.</p><p>Timeline: Shortly before TPM, because a Sith Lord is a harsh master, wielding power over several acolytes. Featuring the Darth Maul after the fanfic “Urban Legends and other Oddities” (part of <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/790597">Page 51</a>) and during Dark Horse's comic <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars%3A_Darth_Maul">Star Wars: Darth Maul</a> (published from September to December 2000).</p><p>Sources: TPM, TCW, the <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page">Wookieepedia</a>, the novel <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cloak_of_Deception">Cloak of Deception</a>, several cityscapes build after my own fashion – as well as the air of the music of the 90thies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing at this story back in mid 2012. In these days, the days before the novel [Tarkin](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Tarkin_%28novel%29) by James Luceno, Palpatine was just Palpatine and had only completed his title of Emperor with the one of Senator as well as that of Darth Sidious. Knowing from the novel [Darth Plagueis](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Darth_Plagueis_%28novel%29) the love of Palpatine's father for a [certain Nabooian rhymer](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Omar_Berenko), I thought it sensible to give Palpatine the first name Omar. Which I will not change into canon compliant Sheev.

“How do you like it?” Maul's voice was a faint, growling whisper in my ear, like a razor cat feeling at ease.

“Boring,” I whispered back, leaning shamelessly into him. To my delight he put his arm around my waist. Yet that was all of the lad's attention I could grab. He still kept watching whatever news-feed or cartoon serial his communicator displayed.

This expensive little gadget was part of our disguise. Quite recently we had revived the image of the successful gym-owners. A multi-racial couple, physically and business-wise fit and not shy to show that. With a costume basing loosely on a Terrelian Jango Jumper's this was not hard to do. Lot's of bare skin and some expensive fibres. However, that I was able to parade my dress with dignity, was the result of an extension of my stay on Kamino. Whatever the old Commodore had in mind when speaking of 'a little brush up', Maul went beyond it. Far beyond. And I still could not grasp how he had kept all the balls in the air regarding our cover and understanding the machinery in the cloning laboratories.

“You're miffed, because I took the liberty to free you of some of your addictions when bettering your profile.” Maul's thumb caressed my naked skin.

The remembrance of the first gulp of booze after our return to Coruscant and how swift and nicely the content of my stomach had spread over the tavern's counter made my cringe.

The lad chuckled: “The genetic code for immunity against stuff like death sticks is taken from the Balosar, so you inherit their alcohol-allergy now too. But I heard,” he chuckled again, “you can adapt your body-reaction with some training.”

Oh, certainly he **was** adapted. Anger welled up in me and I turned my attention to the scenery in front of us. Despite our costly garb and neat shape, nobody in the crowd we overlooked from the stairs to a hovertrain station graced us with more than a swiping gaze. Many of them had probably done, what we only pretended: Left the train at 'Bacta Bath' out of curiosity after the latest holonet feature 'Our Coruscant As You May Never Have Seen It'.

The Maglev station and its small forecourt had the sober crystal-and-steel look of a Christophsis cup-board like all the other public transport stations. There were rumours, this had to do rather with construction cartels than with cleanliness and easy maintainability. Anyway, the opaque blotches on the walls from half successful attempts to remove graffiti, as well as the missing lamp-shades indicated, the 'Bathtub' needed more than the standard routine to stay in order. This might be still the Fobosi District, but the wrong side, because bordering Dacho.

Yet change was at hand. The mid levels of the abandoned buildings of The Works made a picturesque backdrop for a colourful little stage. On this stage several city officials and some members of the Galactic Senate together with their respective retinue tried to deliver rousing speeches about a re-industrialising project. A ground-breaking ceremony, thought as the first step of re-claiming in not so far a future Dacho, the 'Dead District', for Coruscant's economy.

The assembly of potential subjects of this bright prospect had meanwhile become quite big, while speaker after speaker descended to a small rostrum, a few feet below the stage, to paint beautiful pictures of job increase and fruitful business. I did not recognise many, but eventually Palpatine had a word or two about Naboo crude plasma and the off-planet refinery of it.

“I find it pretty interesting,” whispered the razor cat a belated response to my last line in my ear.

From the corner of my eye I saw Maul pocketing the communicator. Then things happened very fast. A ripple in the crowd. A person emerging. Heading for the rostrum. Climbing it. A Yinchorri, a young female in dark military fatigues and matching jacket, wielding a short staff with curious embellishments. Not before she tried to stab Palpatine I realised, it must be a ceremonial weapon, a dagger.

What came out of the Yinchorri's gaping mouth was completely lost, because of the outcry of the fast dispersing crowd. The officials too where spirited away from the stage by their bodyguards. Maul must have felt my muscles also tensed, because his hand became heavier on my hip.

Palpatine had not moved back a single inch. In a suicidal manoeuvre he confronted the attacker, looking clumsy enough to make me wince. Yet suddenly the Yinchorri was sprawled on the lectern like an Ewok sacrifice with the senator standing over her, the dagger now in his hand. I was fascinated by the expression in Palpatine's face. There was no fear, no anger, not even content, just a placid and guarded look. Maul pinched my side, then released me: “Our turn.”

The general back-off surge made it hard to keep our places on the stairs after we where separated. Between jostles from fleeing people I saw two men, probably of Palpatine's retinue, jump from the stage down to the rostrum to bring relief. While the one of them succeeded in dragging first the dagger hand, then the whole senator back from his prey, the other one failed in holding the Yinchorri further down. Perhaps the ornate ceremonial robes where a trifle hampering.

That unsuccessful assassin dashed now toward the station. Her trust in the schedule of the Coruscant Maglev Company would not help. She was stopped by Maul diving headlong into her. I grabbed an arm of the already toppling Yinchorri, fixating it with a sharp turn, feeling then around for the neuralgic points to hamstring her at least partly. You will understand that this sounds easier than it was, if you have ever grappled with an obese, eight foot turtle. Maul however seemed to enjoy it as a game of wrestling amongst buddies and held playfully the upper hand. Yet when I heard the sound of RapideResponse police speeders I thought the tide would turn, because the Yinchorri suddenly pushed twice as hard. Then she became limp.

Maul and I untangled from our threesome to look at two droids, one of them lowering a stunner. They wore CSF colours and saluted crisply: “Thank you, Sir – Ma'am. You can leave now the suspect to us.”

I mopped the sweat off my face while the two droids yanked the Yinchorri from the stairs and shackled her. A third droid, who had looked after the victim of the attack, joined them and I now noticed, they where from the Traffic Division. “Where are the real officers?” I asked.

“We are real officers.” The voice of the third droid was as monotone as that of his colleagues. “SWAT has a shortage right at the moment. There have been several incidents, namely an attack on the Jedi Temple.” The mech officer suddenly pointed to the stage: “Senator Palpatine wishes to see who caught the suspect, Sir – Ma'am.”

I saw that Maul had grown a smug grin on his face. “We're here for --- this?” I asked under my breath when we went over to the stage. But the boy only waved a hand in an not-now gesture while briskly stepping out. So I still knew as less as in the morning when the young Zabrak and I had left our lair. However I was betting now the remainders from breakfast, this whole event had been meticulously staged. Yet, who had become bored of the secret meetings in the old power plant, master or apprentice?

Palpatine sat on the connecting stairs between rostrum and stage, all colour drained from his face. Nevertheless, it still carried the placid expression from moments before. He seemed oblivious of the crowd which did recover its wits and crawled back to snap photos of the scene. Holonet must have upped the pay for citizen-journalists material.

When we arrived, Palpatine gazed up quickly. A faint hue tinted his cheeks: “Why, I know you!” The two men of his entourage who had come to his relief, but now hovered rather useless over him, watched us with a curiosity mixed with disdain. I recognised them as regulars in the senator's staff. Light-skinned humans, sleek and spruce, their years of service visible in an already reclining line of brunette or black hair respectively. Kinman Doriana and Sate Pestage by name if I remembered right.

Maul knelt down before his master, as if just to be at eye-level: “Yes Senator, we had the honour to welcome you at our gym at one or two times.” In spite of a better idea I did the same, kneeling down, but reaching for Palpatine's hand to feel his pulse. His skin was cool and dry, not cold by sweat. The pulse was there and quite stably so. Yet there was something else...

“Oh yes, the martial arts training,” nodded Palpatine. “I hope, I have proved being a good pupil today.” He smile vaguely, as if his resources of professional politeness where close to exhaustion.

“Most impressive, Senator. Most impressive,” purred Maul. “But ---” he reached for the neck of Palpatine, lowering two fingers between collar and skin. When he removed them, they were sticky and wet. The fabric had not only covered a wound, its dark colour had hid the amount of blood lost. “Have him immediately taken to a medic.” Maul looked commanding at the two men of Palpatine's entourage.

“A medic ---,” drawled the black-hair.

“My home,” disagreed Palpatine with a thin voice. “And you come with me. Please.” He pointed at Maul and me.


	2. Chapter 2

The express-lift displayed a number of buttons on a small and functional stripe of brass. One for music, one for light, but no over-ride button for the stops it serviced. Yet my industrious Iridonian had one. As well as an idea how to waste the transit-time in a pleasant way. When he hit a small black device squarely on the elevator's steering, then reaching for me, I said: “Great, now it wont stop at every supply chute.” And that was the last line I said for a good while. 

It took a little eternity to carry Maul and me up to Palpatine's apartment from the lower levels of 500 Republica. 'Downstairs' - as this couple of storeys in the bottom parts of the tower was called - where situated the official residences for the household staff of the owners of the high-end flats. In olden times the servants and aides had usually kept a private home somewhere in Coruscant. Yet, be it the madness called commuting or the sharp rise in housing prices, to live at your own account was a custom rarely observed these days. At least that was, what a chatty Kinman Doriana had said, when sending us down below for 'a little refreshment'. 

Suddenly, between two kisses, the lad asked: “What do you think of Pestage?”

I thought of the gazes Palpatine's aide had shot us, shot especially Maul during our ride through the city and later in the lobby of the apartment tower. The ushering of his colleagues in the senator's staff by a mere lifting of an eye-brow. The whispering into Palpatine's ear. The show of carefully attending to the wounded man... “Princeling.”

“Right on point,” growled Maul been right on point as well, which my body confirmed suit. But the boy's question had distracted me quite a bit. The image of Sate arose before my inner eye when Maul's hip ground against mine... a light-skinned, hard and slender body... The lad stopped short and rasped a harsh laugh: “You would find him too hairy.”

“And Doriana you think, is clean shaven?” I retorted jocularly as well, digging my nails into the smooth skin around the base of the Zabrak's horns.

Maul's voice broke into a groan when he took up his rhythm again. “I'll have an eye on him.”

Some blissful moments later the express slowed down and we had to straighten our clothes and put on a calm and dignified expression.

* * *

The door of the elevator opened to a more lucky cousin of the dark and dank floor several hundred storeys below. Sunlight seeped through wall-high windows, caressing on its way shimmering tapestry and the sleek surfaces of sculptures until it lost itself in an ankle-deep rug spanning the room from wall to wall.

At Outer Rim kingdoms like Cron they have servants to open the doors and greet visitors I've heard. Palpatine's apartment opened automatically, but a lone Pestage and Doriana stood there as if to be at hand if the technique failed though. They had changed from the ornate robes to an uniformly garb of long trousers and stiff collared jackets. Yet, also their fabric was embellished with enough embroidery to dress up a Rodian war mount. Well, Naboo was a ancient monarchy and those its officials.

“Are the quarters to your liking?” Pestage's mouth was a thin line and his eyes hard. Someone had broken his nose long time ago and it had become healed in careful imperfection. Lean and bony-faced Pestage showed off his scars as proud as any veteran. Even if they where nothing but the marks of a youth gang. Even if the plastic surgery to preserve them had cost him a fortune.

Maul heaved softly his shoulders: “For a changing room --- they do.”

Kinman Doriana stood half a step behind Pestage. His hand moved some stubborn strands of silky brown hair back from the high forehead, while he smiled bashfully. In contrast to his colleague he was the able-bodied smart boy, with the sunny, round face every one in the neighbourhood had liked. And he appeared resolved to carry this image as long as possible into the future. 

From an open door further down the hall came muffled noises, like someone talking.

“He's asking for us,” said Maul, pushing past the two men me in tow.

The room we entered had never been thought to become a med point. But at a certain level of wealth you can have medical equipment looking like exquisitely designed furniture. There where some monitors and other machinery in shiny brass, making chamber music together with the gilded room-fountains. An unobtrusive flowery smell wafted through the room, coming from a sizeable bouquet exploding in pastels. Ochre pictures of rangy animals chasing blossoms – or perhaps the other way round – accented the cream-coloured walls. The rug had a deeper ochre, leaning toward red. And pale Palpatine was propped against a mountain of puffy pillows on a recliner or divan or whatever the three med-droids attending him would call it. “So my ears didn't betray me. I was about to send for you. Pray, be seated.”

As we did, I heard in my back the door silently close. Sate Pestage passed us with a chair in hand, taking seat right at the senator's bed-site. “Kinman is instructing the staff,” he said, his eyes still hard when shooting Maul and me a sideways gaze.

The droids whistled their usual med-stuff about a needed rest for the patient. “You can give me something to sleep, then go please,” Palpatine agreed. “Sate? Would you be so kind and close the window blinds.”

Palpatine handed Pestage, who had accomplished his superior’s order with pushing a button in the wall, a pad. The aide jotted down a few words, then held the device out that we could read them. In pin sharp aurabesh the lines went: 'Don't talk. The room is under audio surveillance.'

While Maul just nodded, I snatched the pad, trying my best hand: 'Why don't you do something against it?'

Via the relay of his aide the pad got back to Palpatine. He wrote fast and in letters big enough I could decipher them when he turned the screen toward me: 'I like it this way.' Maul lowered his head a few inches and smirked.

This settled, Palpatine cleared his throat and addressed aloud the boy: “I beg your pardon for almost kidnapping you. But I wonder, what you may think about personal training.”

“Want to exercise more?” Maul leaned forward.

“Yes.”

“You've asked the right people.” That was our business claim. He had sounded it off so proud, I had to look at Maul. Yet if there was any expression in his face, it was masked by the black and red tattoo.

“Fine. My aide can draft a treaty, put down the first instalment or whatever is necessary to acquire your service.” 

I wondered how long this stage play would drag on. And when the rehearsal for me was, if I had any role in it. Now, I should find out very soon... Palpatine sat swiftly upright, the colour back on his cheeks and an almost mischievous smile curling his lips. His voice was weak however: “Sate, the music please. I feel the tranquillizers are taking over.”

Like with the window blinds before, the aide did accomplish his task with pushing a button in the wall. Mellow sounds flooded the room. I was quite certain, they must have a frequency to over-lap the spoken word.

Palpatine pushed his sheets aside, removed the bacta-patch and hopped out of his bed. He marched to the window, standing there as if gauging the artificial landscape of the city-planet despite the closed blinds. A little man of middle age, in rumpled, dirty robes, pondering things of grave consequences. “I have,” he said, ending his contemplation abruptly and approaching our attentively waiting group, “a task for you.” His light-blue gaze did fall on me. “You can assist my aide in an database manipulation.” Maul at my side stirred - Palpatine turned to him: “It pertains to a transport enterprise.”

The two men regarded each other silently for a while and I was curious if Sate Pestage might knew that they conferred without words. Palpatine's aide appeared to be slumped into the cushions of his seat. Yet his hands gripped powerfully the armrests. When he noticed me peeping, Pestage twisted his body that his face was in the shadows.

“Could you please go and speak with Doriana, my other aide? He'll provide security with a protocol, when they come for details of the incident. On your way back, mind to bring me some clothes to change?” Palpatine smiled amiably down at Maul.

The boy looked straight up, smiling too: “No.” Swift like a Stennes Shifter's thought he left the room.

“Now for you two!” At that call Pestage retrieved his gaze from the ground, his lips parted lightly as if wanting to object, but only half-heartedly. Palpatine interlocked his hands behind his back and graced his aide with a fond gaze: “I'm keen to see how good your manipulated data work, Sate. There is a bookkeeping service which keeps the books of a certain cargo line. For a test run they are perfect. Yes, I think we should have a test run. We ought to be careful, don't we? You will have 12 standard hours from now to accomplish your task.”

Pestage muttered a breathless: “Thanks.”

“And if we need longer?” I asked.

Palpatine became dispassionate: “There is an appointment at Naboo. We have to oversee the election of the new ruler. I'm afraid it will not become postponed to accommodate our failures.”


	3. Chapter 3

Pestage owned an airspeeder with high-powered engines and a clearance for them of which he made ample use. Soon the silhouette of Newport appeared before our wind-shield. It seemed to have become undecided between going belly up or continuing business since the time Maul and I had departed with the Scimitar for Muunilinst. Yet albeit thinned out, there still was a steady stream of ferries and barges shuttling from the landing platforms to the space and back.

Under a bridge-like building connecting two stumpy towers of empty offices at almost a mile high we stopped. The vehicle shook slightly from the excess energy and Pestage stroke his chin. He had changed clothes the third time this day, wearing now some nondescript suit of a brown as dark as his eyes. Sitting so close to him I could not help, but notice Maul was right. Stripped of all finery Pestage looked like needing a shave. I thought I could even hear the fine rustle when his hand moved over the tiny stubs.

I pressed the button to start the erase routine of the datapad I had received in preparation for this job. The plot was neat. Nothing fancy though. Actually a one-man thing. If you were that sort of man. When the lights of the pad were back to normal, I shove it into one of the dashboard compartments.

“No questions?” Pestage accompanied his words with an leisurely stroll of his eyes over me.

“No.”

Now his jaws worked slightly. “Wasted time, eh?” He gripped the rim of the speeder ready to climb out. “Suppose you want business finished before you freeze your ass off.”

The jibe at the skin-baring garb I still wore, made me retrieve the datapad. I held it horizontally, pretending it was a holoprojector: "WeatherNet? Can we have more thermostat?" Then I put the pad back again.

Pestage grinned in response: “Okay Longpress, move over. You know were to pick me up.”

“Nice touch to have different entry and exit points, Sate.”

Sate pursed his lips. He did like to hear his name spoken by me. He would probably like the other things I had to say not so much: “Sit tight and fly to the parking lot for the ferry. We leave the speeder there and I come with you.”

“So?” Hissed Sate. “A random gymnastics teacher will learn me how to jump.”

I don't think he actually saw the motion of my arm. It was solely reflex which jerked his body back, away from the glowing vibro-blades of my fan when they bit into the cushion of the driver-seat right between his thighs. “We're together in this. If I had seen your plan earlier --- well ---,” I pulled back my weapon. “Besides, in an long term parking lot nobody expects an kiss-and-ride. And it's only two elevators and one conveyor from here.”

“Do you know what is annoying?” Responded Sate, sounding now positively like the spoiled favourite he was, “that **he** insisted on assistance.” There was a bitter line around his mouth as he powered the engines up and directed his airspeeder's nose toward our new parking destination.

After storing the vehicle we mingled with the travellers, until we've reached a point close to our target. I have to give him that, he navigated the place as sure as an Bimmissari Dart-Fish its pond. Whatever the video surveillance collected, certainly no head-shots of us. The six hours Pestage had kept me waiting in the lobby of Palpatine's apartment were not wasted then. Six hours with nothing to entertain myself beside a tea-table book 'Holy Smoke - The Kiffar Of Azurbani', autographed in broad letters by Dooku.

As soon as we had managed to sneak from the passengers' ways into the bowls of the office-tower we were alone and could move faster without causing a stir. Yet when Sate reached for the knob of the door to the last hallway to cross, I had to grip his arm hard. It felt brawny and tensed, but he did not put up a fight. At the other side of the door three voices came closer. The light went out at our side. The voices passed, fading away in a mumble. I let my fingers crawl down Sate's arm until I held his wrist. Then I put his hand firmly on the knob. We stepped into a well lit hallway.

A choked sound made me look at my companion. Sate sniggered: “Nice touch.”

“Just happened to hear them.”

Wordless Sate turned me his back. He fumbled something from a pocket, then bend down to pick the lock of a door. At the small name plate an accurately cut flimsy was pinned, informing the reader this was a book keeping service using Nimbanil technology.

The lock gave in to the tool's ministrations with a muffled purr of electric currents. We entered a small room. It was not really small actually, measuring roughly 1000 square-feet. However, stuffed by shelving and terminals, as well as irregularly cut, it appeared oppressing like a Harch nest. An air washer made throbbing sounds, but there was the smell of dust. I perched atop a desk. Some bored bookkeeper had tried to print a star-map on its plate with the wet bottom of a caf mug.

Pestage squatted in front of the nearest of the terminals. From another pocket of his suit he conjured a modified datapad. Via a connector, which looked definitely home-grown, he plugged the thing in. On the terminal's screen immediately popped off lines of symbols. It seemed however to work to his satisfaction, because Sate pursed his mouth quite bonnily. As fast as it had started it was over. Sate rose, pocketing the datapad: “Beat it --- and pray that we're still in schedule.”

“Not so fast.” I kept the place on the desk, pointing with my fan at the door of the office. It opened furtively. I moved my legs out of the way of a R-8009 utility droid.

Sate stood very erect and very pale. He licked his lips.

The cleaner started its erratic route, collecting dust here and wiping desks there.

“Sate,” I said, “Sate, what is this with the ears in the walls of the Senator's apartment?”

Pestage's gaze lingered at the cleaning droid. “You really take a chance, don't you?” He wetted his lips again. “A commitment. A voluntary agreement between the senators to show they have nothing to hide. Fighting corruption and information leaks, you know?”

“I see, as well who might have planted that idea.” Certainly the other senators too had discovered a sudden, unexplainable love for music.

“Yes, he's a genius.” Palpatine's aide seemed gradually to relax. “The whole problem had become only bigger by that.” He chuckled titillated.

“Is that so?”

Again the chuckle: “Oh yes! The Senator has plans. Plans --- Have you ever been at Aralia? Ever watched the sabacc players there?" Those questions where purely rhetoric, breathless Sate continued: “When one wants to break the bank, he prepares well. He goes with a plan, a grand plan --- But you should know, if you're one of --- **them**.” The sudden smile in Sate's sharp face looked genuine enough. Yet it didn't quite reach his eyes. Perhaps they were too deep-set for that. Or he had picked up this trick from his superior.

The cleaner rolled over to the terminal Sate had manipulated. A milky haze of detergent was blown on the interface. Then the collector made an obscene sucking noise, interrupted by occasional gargling and hiccups.

I slid from my elevated seat. “I wanted to be secure. These little tin-cans are somewhat prone to stop in their routine and call for enforcement at the slightest exception.”

Sate eased the door shut behind us. On our way back he didn't take up the yarn about the Senator's plans again. But I heard the light rustle when he stroke his chin then and now. When we finally sat again in the speeder in the parking lot, Sate stretched his arm leisurely over the top of the backrest, laying his hand on my shoulder: “Capping off the day?”

Now that was gall! But I couldn't take him serious, I really couldn't: “I have a class of clumsy pupil to teach how to hop before we fly. Perhaps at Naboo.”

“Sure, sure. Businesswoman,” said Sate not responding to my jocular tone, “I'm wanted by penalty order there. Not going. Never.” He spit noisily over the rim of the airspeeder on the ground. “Next time I'm doing this with droids.”

* * *

Palpatine's aide had dropped me close to a Maglev station in a lower level of the Uscru. On my way to its entrance I stopped at a public com-booth. The code for our gym brought no hologram, only Maul's voice telling the business hours. So much for being one of **them**. The battered head of a droid flew past the com-booth, followed by a gaggle of Lutrillian businessmen. Well fed, well dressed and tanked up to their wobbly triple jowls from celebrating an acquisition. Staggering and jeering they disappeared around the corner.

I re-keyed our gym's code, just to hear Maul's voice again. It sounded hoarse and alluring - but held otherwise no information for me. For a moment I toyed with the idea to call the Senator's office and ask for Kinman Doriana. But the Senate's District was closer to this place than I to a welcome perhaps. The Lutrillians made more noise down the road. It seemed they where toppling swoops and pushing speeders around. Someone should really take care of them...

On the platform of the Maglev station the Lutrillians had restrained themselves to holler sleazy offers at the passengers waiting. A shard from one of the damaged swoops down the throat of the biggest squaller should stop them immediately... Yet I had collected none, I went to a compartment farther up of the arriving train.

I chose a seat with good sight at of one of the in-train screens. Silently it played the usual loop of holonews – fans gathering to celebrate the start of season 500 of TCW, Yinchorri attacked the Jedi Temple, two blown up CSF stations, the petition against the close-down of the Maglev lines 'Red' and 'Zero Blue' unsuccessful, a Yinchorri tried to assassinate a member of the Galactic Senate, no decision so far about the rebuilding of the Golden Nyss Shipyards after the destruction by Yinchorri forces despite high unemployment numbers amongst construction workers, Coruscant consumers fearing a sharp rise in beer prices because of an export embargo the Hutts of Tattoine put on Jawa beverages...

That suited my newly acquired alcohol intolerance just perfectly. I laughed.

Across the aisle was a small motion. When I turned my head, my gaze met that cold and challenging one typical of female Arconas. It were two, with battle-hardened, wiry bodies.

The train jerked slightly and an empty bottle rolled along the aisle. 

One of the Arconas made a nod with her triangular head toward the commotion caused by the Lutrillian's further down the train. Then they blinked their yellowish eyes at each other and rose. One station later, from the window of the leaving train, I saw the two Arconas, the Lutrillians and Coruscant Security. The later one in new, extra heavy riot gear with unwieldy blasters. One of the Lutrillians was vomiting convulsively.


	4. Chapter 4

Warily I hung my beak into the glass. It smelled tame enough to dare a round of training with it. “Blossom wine spritzer,” encouraged me the servant with a face as haughtily as if she had invented the mixture herself. She was barely of age, almost a foot smaller than me and I pitied her for the heavy jewellery and make-up she had to ware in order to match the guests vintage splendour in this ballroom. “Thank you,” I said. The servant dropped a curtsy, then fluttered off.

The small-talk around me had not stopped. I only understand bits and parts of it, since nobody except the servants appeared to care to switch to Galactic Standard Basic after Palpatine had been greeted and formally introduced me to the Ferentina dignitaries who threw this party. However, thanks to my recently enhanced flash-learning ability, I tagged along. One stoked up red-head - actually everyone of the locals brandished just another edition of Palpatine's hair colour - roared jocularly an expletive-laced comment about some water-dwelling people, Gungans, standing in the way of plasma prospecting. Others chimed in, but then turned to praising Palpatine as a pleasant and well-adjusted addition to some board of directors, doing what he could do in trailblazing for business connections throughout the galaxy.

I smiled acknowledgement, took a sip and watched the place over the rim of the goblet. In the corner, on a dais, a small orchestra treated its string instruments gently. I could not imagine anyone would try to dance on the dark, wooden floor, which was polished to a liquid shine. Besides, all those long gowns and voluminous cloaks could make enough wind to extinguish the candles placed in front of the gold-rimmed pier glasses. Perhaps dancing was not the main attraction here - through a big, double door I saw servants laying out a buffet in silver and crystal. A bit I envied Sate for spending this night somewhere in Coruscant's underbelly. For me the perks of belonging to a senator's entourage seemed to be reduced to have been able to avoid Naboo's picky customs. The flight itself had been uneventful, Maul and I doing our duty with Palpatines training and the crew of the shuttle mostly ignoring us as the senator's new pets. Kinman Doriana was the only exception. He got along with Maul very well. Even now I spotted the two down the room, surrounded by a group of giggling women.

I took another sip, then tilted my head to look inconspicuously through one of the windows of the ball room while the Nabooians prattled away. Outside spread Ferentina's Lower Market. It was an irregular oblong, narrowing toward a bridge's ramp. The ramp ended at the crest of a dam. It walled in the Andrevea, which here was a thin, but powerful mountain stream. The late evening sun let appear occasional walkers on the dam like black cardboard silhouettes. There was still a lot of traffic coming from the col and the newly opened tunnel aside it, and heading for the bridge. A couple of vendor booths on the market looked like thrift wood washed ashore by the passing rush. Behind them, a huge department store rose from its building pit. Maybe a hour later, from the promenade on the dam, the town would appear as tidy as it had been before modern times business thrived.

The watered wine rested comfortable in my belly, but made me ponder. In a side-note during a holonews feature about money laundering, Newport had been mentioned as closed down. I didn't want my or Sate's name all over the news, but details would have been nice. Also the talk about the coronation at Naboo had piqued my interest - or rather the absence of it. There had been a king and there would be a queen, and that was that. Because of the queen's young age as well as the king's old, I guessed they where mere figure heads for a royal advisory council doing the real ruling. Where such Palpatine's plans? Perhaps I should have milked the senator's aide. But with someone who oozed trouble like a Falleen pheromones, you ought to play save. Albeit Sate was probably that type of bloke you could have lots of fun with, when trussing up and gagging him before.

A small boy popped up in front of me: “The Lady wishes to talk to you.”

“The Lady?”

“Lady Palpatine calls you! You **can't** refuse that,” exclaimed the man from the plasma-business, suddenly remembering his Galactic Basic. “How are you little Palpatine?” He tried to ruffle the kid's hair, who evaded quickly with a step sidewards and an aloof expression on his face: “Thanks, fine, master Tapalo.” Some matrons in frumpy frocks of fustian got into a huddle and exchanged what sounded like: “I still can't fathom why she championed that Naberrie girl.” “A fancy, my dear. A fancy.”

I let the boy guide me toward a group of settees and chairs, occupied by another assortment of red-heads who served as mount for a white diamond, which shared with her son the look of geniality and elegance. Time had been merciful with the lady. Her rosy skin was wizened, but her chin was firm, her cheeks high and her nose not overly sharp. The hair was full and delicate as if spun from Endor's sun crystals. This blinding white repeated itself in the long gown flowing around her dainty body like a liquid.

“And you are a personal trainer?” Lady Palpatine's Galactic Standard Basic was as immaculate as that of a holonet news crawl and she was bold as old. She held her hands out that I could lift her up from the chair like I was a relative of her, assigned to be at grandma's beck and call. Eventually standing, she did hold my hands a bit longer, examining my palms: “Oh no, love. You should do something about this --- Always those heavy weights to lift. Omar?” She rose her voice. “Omar, that is most inconsiderate of you.”

A flush-faced Palpatine approached us out of the blue: “Mother, you know, that I disapprove ---” Her cronies where all ears.

“I only know what I disapprove! Look at her hands. The Force knows she's no beauty. But there is no sense in spoiling the little she has.”

Palpatine resisted the gaze of the lady only for a short time, then he faltered: “I'll take care for some gloves.”

“That's what I thought Palpatine,” smiled his mother. Now she pinched my cheek: “Don't accept any apologies from him. You're not that selfishly in love with your body like this Zabrak is. Palpatine needs his training.”

“Rest assured, Kahuna and I have worked out a most effective schedule,” simpered the reproached, which made a couple of mouth corners in our audience go skyward.

“A shame, that you won't stay at my cottage. Naberrie asked me if you would come.”

Palpatine's sigh was stage-ready: “You know, business. Plasma, carbonite - carbonite, plasma. There might be even an after-party! All those talks will render me a poor company.”

“The election is business too. In case you forgot how I supported your fancy.”

“And I do appreciate it, mother.” He didn't change his voice or cast gazes of icicles suddenly, but the effect was all the same.

“Oh well,” breathed the Lady while her entourage looked decently away, “it has been a wonderful evening, however I think I retire.”

Palpatine and I watched her summoning some of his younger siblings, which where not happy, yet had to follow, and then leaving.

“Now, that is settled,” said Palpatine to the closing door.

“What?” I asked clueless.

Palpatine smiled benevolent and offered me his arm: “Lady Mara Palpatine, my dear mother, comes from a time where you did promote your business by a choiceful marriage. She was checking on our relationship.”

He still could do this chill-thing with my spine.

Palpatine patted my hand laying on his forearm: “She approved. And unless you become a fitness-queen with your own channel at the holonet and a few but very successful health-food farms, nothing will change.” 

“I thought at Naboo it is the father's to decide?” I asked out of spite.

Unruffled, Palpatine patted my hand again while guiding me through the crowd in direction of the dining room: “He only did one decision in his entire life - to become a minister of war - and had the decency to die early. But those are old family stories. I think I have something more interesting for you. You'll find in your room a stack of flimsi regarding battle droids. I would like to hear your opinion as a professional. Actually, I wish you to have a look and correct what seems you wrong or surplus. There is especially one model I'm interested in. And I would like to hear very soon from you.”

* * *

It is strange how slow time can run in the moment you're attacked. “That is for Fulve!” While a dart - metal with greenish hue, simple design, no composite - logged itself into my flesh, I recognised its thrower - female, pale-faced, dirty red clothes - as well as the reaction of the people around me – astonishment, curiosity, fear. I have neither Maul's nor a Jedi's marvellous talents, however I'm trained to use the slot in time before pain would render me unfit to respond: my fan with blades retraced the way of the dart.

The attacker staggered back from the impact of my throw. If it had been not just vibro-blades, but a javelin, I would have nailed her to the ground. The woman went down, writhed, rolled on her side, grabbed for the weapon sticking in her chest, shivered violently and fell silent. It smelled of burnt meat.

I realised, I was still standing. Standing on the promenade cresting the Andrevea dam. A warm, setting sun over the river valley at my left, stucco embellished houses of Ferentina's upper and lower town to the right and the solid stone tiles of a mosaic under me.

Some loafers had stopped, craning their necks, but keeping a distance. I plugged the dart. It had barbs. Blood shot out of the wound, spoiling my party-dress. The stream should wash out any venom the dart might have been poisoned with. Then it dawned on me, that I could be immune after Maul had improved my genetic matrix and just need to sit out the contamination. Immediately I pressed a fist against the wound, but had to lower on my knees to keep balance. The world around me lost its colour.

Out of the rising grey a police speeder appeared. An officer leaned over me: “Ma'am, medical help will be here in a moment. Can you give me your name and a few words about the incident please.” He was young with eager hands. My body became lowered into a more comfortable position. A med pack was suddenly there. Thankfully I grabbed it and pressed now with better effect against the still bleeding wound. “I will ---”

“She will not answer. And there is no need for a public clinic.” The officer and his speeder were dwarfed by a Tantive machine stopping at my other side.

I heard his sharp intake of breath, but the officer said nothing. He took a step back when from the big speeder some servants issued and heaved me off the ground. One collected my fan from the dead Nightsister's chest. Lady Mara's clear voice cut again through my still greyish bearings: “I really wish they would know where their place is.” That was funny. But I could not laugh. Then the aristocratic vehicle carried me gracefully away.

Mixing into the traffic going toward the flatland, we made slowly yardage. It became better when we where over the bridge, but there was still quite a number of freight and personal transports. Squished between the broad shoulders of two servants, the cool wind revived me enough to remind my manners: "Thank you, Lady Palpatine."

She recognised that with a curt nod. With the same non-committal motion she responded to people greeting her from other speeders.

We did cross the Andrevea again, now wide between marshy banks, then entering the valley of another river which hurried to carry its water to the main stream. The valley's picturesque walls blocked the last light of the setting sun in our back. I only heard the river several feet below us and saw an occasional tree ripped from the dark by the head-light of the speeder. There must be a lot of trees, because the air was heavy with the fragrance of their blossoms.

The traffic tinned out. When the valley made a steep rise toward the still sunlit alps we turned right into a small lane. Now we were completely alone. The mouth of the lane had been marked with a sign - 'private property, no trespassing'. Judged by the way we had made during the last hour, the Lady's cabin should be at the same ridge as Ferentina, yet farther south, overlooking not only the Andrevea, but the swamp-land it emptied in too. It's name began with La... or Lia... I could not lift the word from the depths of my brain right now. There was a piercing, prickly pain around the wound. Either from the curdling blood or from some tail of venom.

Suddenly the big Tantive came to an abrupt halt. Just beyond the reach of the speeder's lights seemed the nightly darkness to thicken into solidness. There was a ripple in this darkness and I recognised Maul, lowering a gloved hand. He was still in his black, formal robes worn at the party, yet behind him hovered the swoop I knew from Coruscant. He usually stored it at the Scimitar. But this ship was not here, was it?

The driver and some of the other guys in the speeder seemed, after the initial shock, not to be averse to a brawl, but Lady Palpatine gestured her servants to hold it and said unimpressed: “What is it? Do you fancy yourself a highwayman?”

“Indeed, you have something I want.” Maul's voice was threatening and enticing at the same time. There was a faint redish glow emanating from his eyes. But it did not litup his face in the shadow of the cowl.

The Lady responded coolly: “I don't think my son is tolerating such behaviour. I will inform him when I'm back at Theet.”

I expected a growl, but the lad gave her just a lordly glare.

“I see,” said Lady Palpatine after a while. Her voice was like a breeze going through brittle branches. The two men sitting left and right of me gasped in unison, one reaching for his throat.

“I will relay your son your best wishes.” When he bowed, the boy's manners matched the quality of his robes. “Come!” This was for me. By a sudden inflow of power I was able to rise and leave the speeder on my own feet. I didn't even stagger when walking over to Maul. The Force is such a marvellous thing.

The Tantive's engines whined, then it sped away. In the now ensuing darkness, I heard finally the lad's growl: “How do you feel?”

“Empty like a tavern maid's smile at 3 o'clock in the morning.”

“Hop on,” Maul chuckled. “Master is expecting results until the sun rises.”

“Mind if I bleed on your bike?”

Maul's robes rustled when he mounted the swoop, dragging me down to sit sideways in front of him. “Guess what?” A warm breath grazed my ear, an arm was tightly around me: “I recently found a name for it --- Bloodfin.”


	5. Chapter 5

“May your flights not outnumber your landings.”

I throw the Togrutan beggar a small ingot. The woman thanked me, repeating her blessing again and again, like a defective droid.

“They're a nuisance, are they not?” The handicraft merchant didn't sound mean. He was Caridan and only trying to engage me into a sales talk. “You're looking for something special, young lady?”

“A cigarette case --- for my bro,” I responded hastily.

“And that we have!” The Caridan heaved a tray with glossy metal and enamel before me. “I think this selection will satisfy you.” A professional smile hit me, then he turned to three other customers, waring their ridiculusly expensive 'neetoah' like only married people from wealthy Bethars can do.

Slowly I sorted through the small boxes. I had clapped my eyes on more than one Togrutan pretending to be a budding artist to sell you, the revered connoisseur, cheap crap. But I never had seen one just begging until now. Well, Empress Teta, or rather Cinnagar, its capital, had been a disappointment anyway.

Coruscants self-appointed twin boasted to host more wonders than the galactic capital, but was less in size and sophistication. It started with the fact that only half of the planet was a city - the other half was landscape ploughed through and through by the carbonite mining industry. And it ended with imports like Coruscant Fashions instead of home-grown tailors. Solely Empress Teta's situation, to be located at the very centre of the galaxy, or as close as a planet could be and remain habitable, meant something. Its nightly sky was spectacular.

I gazed over the 'Rishii Maze Market', and weighted the pros and cons of getting back to our ship. Palpatine had, before leaving with his entourage for the Iron Citadell and some negotiations about the local ore, asked me to take - oh - just a gander at another bunch of battle droid files. After identifying two design flaws within the first ten pages I felt bored. But when I thought to spend some quality-time with Maul instead, the boy was gone. The members of the small skeleton crew of the senatorial shuttle had no idea where he could be either - one, grinning sourly, suggested: “Alderaan Museum of Fine Arts.” So I decided to give the city's renowned architecture a shot. For dressing I chose from the cockpit-crew uniforms. It looked sharp enough.

Customs was almost non-existent and soon I stood on a wide square from where several broad boulevards fanned out. They were tree lined, house lined and long. Very long. Yet not endless. It seemed, that, if I would just walk a while, I would arrive some-place. And it would be an important place. Wondering what might provoke such an impression, I hooked up with a group of bespectacled Sullustans and their local guide. I learned how streets form long vistas and sculptures pronounce vanishing points. As well, that Cinnagar's response to Coruscant skyscrapers was its homogeneous formal vocabulary in double-pitched roofs and décor.

Eventually, at the foot of the Monument to the Lost Navigator it was enough. I didn't accompany the Sullustans for a visit of the Hyperspace Navigators Guildhouse. A friendly citizen pointed me the way to the Club Corellia. None of our ship's crew on shore leave would be there, because it was too posh for anyone beyond a chief mate. Yet neither I should never arrive, because on my way toward a well blended Sonic Servodriver I stumbled over the 'Rishii Maze Market' full of artful trinkets. And I stuck.

The place was a pretty good copy of an artisans street market. You could even forget for a moment the artificial ceiling of a hall spread over the colourful, rolling landscape of tents and not the open sky. That installation had everything, even a few pick pockets who skimmed the crowd neatly. One was special however. A middle-aged male, not too well-fed and too well-dressed. At least this part of his act he got together. How he conducted his work was but a shame for his honourable guild. When he had singled out a prey, he followed it in such an ostentatious unobtrusive manner, grinning all the way in pleasant anticipation, he was sooner or later noticed. Usually sooner. When I saw the fifth time how only the thief's long legs kept him from being caught by an angry tourist, I decided, I had wasted enough of Palpatine's day with lingering and loafing. The Caridan was still talking with the wealthy threesome. I ran my hand valedictory over the sleek surfaces of the cigarette cases.

Walking shipwards, some minor roads came as a handy short-cut to avoid the crowded principal ones. In one of these narrow connecting streets I heard swift steps in my back approaching. For the ordinary busybody they where too soft, too concerned with suppressing the sound of military boots on cobble stones. A thug? I whirled around - not just any thug! That guy, the luckless pick pocket, lifted slowly his fists to show a pair of knuckle-dusters: “Here comes the tooth-fairy.” He still grinned in pleasant anticipation.

I got him straight in his liver. He bend as nicely as ever a servant at this planet's namesake court. But before I could use my advantage for a quick pull-out, jet packs hissed and the two of us where surrounded by folks in Mandalorian armour. When a blaster of remarkable size was pressed into my kidneys, I knew this was not the rescue-guard.

“Move. At the end of the street is a lorry. Climb in.”

I glanced over the backside-façades of the shapely houses containing the street. False windows with painted on flower-boxes, gates for supplies and waste management - but no surveillance. The traffic at the boulevard was an indifferent, distant hum. My attackers had formed a circle tight enough to bar everyone without a jet pack from fleeing. However with the exception of the guy in my back, all stood also far enough from me to prevent a fast grab for one of their blasters. I opted to play along for the time being.

The lorry was a huge and unsightly air-speeder with questionable pedigree. Once boarded, the blaster muzzle prodded my back until I complied and curled up in the foot-room of the vehicle. The still incapacitated thug was thrown in aside me. From this bottom position I watched the guys removing their helmets. The one handling me was an old war-mount. A grey-head, emaciated and with a scar at the left of her wide-set, light eyes, which let her appear like winking. But joy was hardly in her book of words. Perhaps, because her and the other guys armour and armament was well maintained, but in dire need of replacement with something not straight out of the 'Memorial of the Mandalorian Wars'.

Our transport slowly took up speed and altitude. The Winker spoke into her wrist-com. It seemed to regard a ransom-note. But I could be mistaken, because it were only a few words and not Galactic Basic. No one else talked after that. No one of the pack was not human, all faces as hard and aged as their blasters.

The journey was short enough to make me believe we had just moved over into one of the seedier quarters of Cinnagar. However, when I was roused by that darn blaster muzzle again, it was the space port. Some shackles clicked, now my hands were fixed at my back. I craned my neck to get the exact position. The moment I made out the colours of a senatorial cruiser amongst all the other ships, the Winker said: “Don't even think of it.”

She had not the faintest idea of the power of thought. A familiar figure stood at the ramp of Palpatine's shuttle and I thought I could even see the black and red lines of tattoo on his face. I was that busy making my mind open and readable, I missed which type of Kom'rk class ship I was pushed into. I barely noticed the MandalMotors plate at one of it stilts.

Nothing happened. I was locked up in a small cabin, my shackles released and I strapped on a bunk. Still nothing. The engines made some noise and everything shuddered until we were spaceborn. Nothing, nil, zero. I was unstrapped and the shackles on my wrists reapplied. This time however with my hands in front and completed by a bond which leashed me to a wall farthest from the bulkhead.

Of course, the boy might have kept busy with errants by his master and thus not have been able to react immediately, but... I made myself as comfortable as possible on the hard steel floor and shelved all reasoning for later. A good 2 parsec later. Those two parsec meaning the distance between me and my kidnappers of course. The Kaminoans had implanted into our skulls only one reaction to setbacks: regroup, take aim and attack. And I knew a thing or two about ransom-work from my batch's old times, albeit it had been the speciality of A-Long and B-Long rather.

I evaluated my resources - the bracelet was there and in one of the bootlegs stuck the fan with blades. In the other the silver cigarette case I had lifted at the 'Rishii Maze Market'. My abductors must have mighty trust in the shackles used, because not frisking me. I surveyed what restrained me. The handcuffs were of the finest beskar. Thin, elastic, but strong enough to defy even a lightsabre's blade. If I had only two foot long of this and no other weapon, I could go through walls. Not now of course. We were probably in hyperspace and I should better wait and see where we'd come out. For starters I tried some gymnastics. After a few repetitions I was sure, I could bring my shackled hands back and forward at wish. The spot where the Dathomir dart had stuck protested only faintly.


	6. Chapter 6

The pneumatics of the bulkhead hissed softly. However, it could not be the usual food delivery. Mandalorians eat only once a day, but that as regular as a clockwork. Since my digestion was operating normal, I had been able to calculate covered distance from the passing time. We must have crossed the Core, and more or less I expected to walk through the white sands of Mandalore in the next moment. I also hoped for a proper Mandalorian steam bath, because not only my boots were in need of a shining.

The ramp of our starship lowered on sand indeed. Yet it was the hard, grey sort rivers bring from the mountains. The water was in our back, appearing shallow and stony and of the same colour as the sand. In our front, on a precariously low elevation above the stream, a flock of simple huts and some tents dwelt. The range of rocks behind them rose tentatively to almost 1000 feet. Staying within the colour-card of this place, it was light-grey under the dark blue of a sky heavy with rain clouds. The shrubs and woods climbing up the washed out stone however looked juicy green.

A push with a blaster ended my contemplation and I scampered toward the settlement. Some rough cut palisades sealed it against the surrounding nature. This fence was seemingly just the other day taken down in some places, to make space for the tents with Mandalorian clan signs. “Where are we?” I did ask, not seriously expecting an answer.

“Miners Moon.” The speaker of the helmet let the voice sound flat and metallic. But the Winker had an metallic tinge in her voice anyway.

In front of the first hut stood a small child, watching our approaching group with as much interest as it was digging in its nose. Miners indeed. An old man appeared from inside the hut, giving us the once-over while snatching the kid and retreating. One of the Mandalorians called after him: “Get some hands grandpa! There's a ship to unload.”

The face of the child and that of the old man had been as dirty as their garb threadbare. I reduced my expectations from a steam bath to a bucket of cold water. I didn't saw anyone else of the settlers, yet I was sure, they watched us. 

The rickety huts inside the palisades were half barn, half home. In a few spots a shiny plate from a dismantled spaceship sat a light accent on the reign of neglect. Fittingly were outside the palisades neither fields nor gardens, but a huge heap of rubbish. Food and beverage containers of the most common brands of the galaxy and not much else. I figured, we had landed on one of those planets or moons like Andooweel, which human colonists from the Core Galaxy conquered with great effort once, but over time forgot what they initially wanted there.

I was ushered into the biggest tent. It was empty except for a group of three and a cosily crackling fire. Closest to the fire sat a burly man with black, military-cut hair and the bearing of an exiled dictator. His Mandalorian armour was of clearly better quality than those of his soldiers. The beskar's tint changed from a creamy white shine to a deep blue hue. That hue repeated itself in the man's hair and on some spots of his scalp where the dye had not been rinsed carefully enough. Casually his right hand gripped what appeared to be the foot-long hilt to a vintage vibrosword, hefted to his belt. His left, resting on the table, held a datapad he read. When he put it down, I could see the daring majuscules of old Mandalorian war chronicles.

The other two were a man and a woman. She - obviously from the village - young, plump and in a docile way pretty. He, a dashing blonde youth with a strong face and eyes so blue I could make them out even in the dim light of the tent. Between him and the settlers girl sat a bowl. When the girl took a spoon full, he looked intently at her, then took a bit himself.

“That is what we have, Sir! Note is delivered, nobody followed us, no casualties. Only Eno'tka is still out. She has a bad right.” My warden removed her helmet in a gesture of reverence for the chief.

The burly man turned his mighty head and lifted an eyebrow: “As always a nice choice, Reral. Your profession is?”

A fist hit me behind the ear. Reral obviously did not like praises of her taste in women. “Astrogator,” I spit, supposing this might secure me a more comfortable position than 'personal trainer'.

The chief said something I could translate to about 80% from the vocabulary I had picked up time ago at Sundarie's building sites, but I growled: “Speak Basic.”

The settlers girl turned her head, staring at me mouth open and spoon in mid-air. The blonde youth hit her face. It was a short, sharp and precise slap. Nothing serious though. Not more serious than pulling the bit on a Brezak which isn't well enough broken in for riding. With a sob she took up her poison taster duties again.

Yet the chief seemed to find my answer rather amusing: “Don't understand me, eh? I said: I thought a senator could afford a Givin. But you're not such an eyesore as they are. Actually you look a lot like the folks from Concord Dawn. Like this Fett.”

“No word about Fett!”

“Why,” the chief waved his hand dismissing at the Blonde without turning his head, “you of all have the least reason to sulk, Pre. He is your ancestors killer. Granted, a fine blade. But be it, no word about him.” He however didn't cling to his promise, releasing several lines of elaborated Mandalorian curses mostly revolving around the inability to procreate of the cursed. Pre intervened a second time, his voice sharp and cutting. The word Count let me pricking up my ears even more than before. The galaxy is brimming with nobility, yet a certain man from Serenno seemed to have talked that Fett into leave. The chief answered the allegations like rebuking an insolent child, denying responsibility for the loss of a good man. But he added another string of curses. Finally he braced himself: “I'm Oak, captain of the Darksabre militia. The finest blades of clan Seles.” He pointed with a thick finger at his broad chest in case I might have missed about whom he was talking.

Blonde Pre put down the spoon, opening his blue eyes wide: “And Vizsla.” A vein at his temple throbbed.

This time Oak didn't even care to make a placating gesture. He had only eyes for me: “Step closer. Sit down. Reral, see that they bring something drinkable!” He smiled, his finger now beaconing: “An astrogator. With a bad right. Not your only assets it seems. Why don't relax while we wait for this senator to answer the ransom note?”

The tent was held by a couple of quad poles. To sit at the chief's table would bring me closer to them... However, I was released of planing my escape, when Reral was pushed aside by an incoming Mando in full armour. Stumbling and in the stumble fumbling at the helmet, the soldier did fall on his knees. The helmet rolled away. The man's eyes where glassy and bulging, staring sightless at us. From a distorted mouth in a chalk-white face came a wail. “They --- !” It said.

I did not wait for him to elaborate - with hip and thigh I heaved the table. From the corner of my eye I saw a blonde flash and heard the impact of some Mandalorian throw-weapon in the wood when the table canted over. But I was on the ground already, making my little gymnastics to bring my hands in front of me. The heat of a blaster bolt grazed my right shoulder when I jumped up again to throw myself powerfully against the closest quad pole. Then the heavy fabric of the tent did fall down, and it was not longer of consequence who had fired at me, because I had my fingers in my bootleg and grabbed the fan with blades.

When I had cut out of the tent, I was overwhelmed by the boom of a fully grown battle around me. First thing I spotted, was the face of one of the settlers. Under the dirt it was as colourless and distorted as that of the messenger Mando had been. Early drops of a rain shower made a blaster's fire visible as a line of dots. The line ended in the dirty face, blotting it out. A heavy, makeshift hatch dropped at the ground. I dropped to the ground too, avoiding it. The Mandalorian shooter just stormed on, jumping over me, propelled by a stuttering push from a jet-pack. Blood mixed in the rain. I saw where the hatch had stuck. A hut close by erupted in flames, adding a deafening roar to the madness boiling in this cauldron. Ducked I crawled toward the line of palisades, aiming for the ship.

Beyond the palisades the ground should be easier to manoeuvre, but I would be visible like a wanderer in the Void. I had to be fast. The Kom'rk shimmered sweet in the down-pour... Something stopped me. The sky was not longer just heavy by rain-clouds. It looked now rather like an enormous bowl put over village, river, trees and hills to suffocate all life. A cold which seemed to originate from the marrow of my bones started to creep through my body, freezing me irrevocably to the ground. Desperately I tried to collect myself and break the immobilisation, because I felt, that something of unspeakable monstrosity was reaching for this place... I think I screamed...

“Wrong direction, smarty pants,” a well-known, hoarse voice said.

The rain needled my face, finding its way into my gaping mouth. Wordless I held my shackled wrists toward Maul. The lad ripped the beskar apart with one hand. “Put your fan away and these on. I'll find you a blaster.” He slapped some gloves at me. Maul too was in gloves and cloak and all. Only the hood he had removed from his head. The crown of little, pointy horns glistened sharp in the shower. There was a carefree smile on the lad's lips when he ignited his lightsabre and turned to enter the village.

“Where do you want to go?!” I shouted at his back. Maul lifted an arm, pointing to the rocky range behind the settlement. However, he might also just giving the group of inseparably tangled fighters appearing suddenly in our sight a Force push. Next moment they where scattered all over the place as if a detonator hit home. This attracted a squall of new warriors. Without further ado, Maul engaged and I had to follow if I wanted the benefits of a double-bladed lightsabre used with great dexterity.

In the lads wake, I sorted through the dead and dying. It were mostly village-people, with no weaponry aside sharpened pipes and planks with nails. There was an occasional Mando too, albeit in pieces. “Crap!” I yelled at Maul.

“Jump on my back,” snarled Maul in response. My weight seemed to concern the boy not more than his empty dangling hood. Like a red and black whirlwind he bore down on settlers and militia indiscriminately. His two blades cut through man or wall with the same devouring speed, and he broke his stride only to meet a jet-pack powered Mando in mid-air or to spread glowing embers with generous gestures. Finally I was shaken off, falling on a blaster - it was good. “Now go! I clean up here.”

I let Maul do what he had to do and shot me through smoke and rain in direction of the hills. From beyond was no shuttle to spot, it must have landed deeper in the highland. There was one beak of rock, very close to the backward palisades, and looking more or less ascendable with a hight of just 900 feet or so. This was now my destination. That I made it though was probably not because of my quick trigger finger, but because the settlers and militiamen where mainly occupied with locking jaws like mating Rancors.

My blaster signalled earlier than I had wished depletion. I rammed it into the direction of some hands reaching for me and darted over the last yards toward the ridge. The brushes closed over me like green water when I dived in. A slope started almost instantly and very step. My newly acquired gloves seemed to be made of cortosis. I gained that from their weight and grip. They were of great help while climbing through the under-grow and later, when the forest made way for naked, rain-wet rock.

At this point I must be be visible from the village, but I did not care, scaling the crag as quick as I could. Suddenly I stopped. There was a motion on a ledge I was about to hoist me upon. Black fabric, lightly brushing over the stone. “You’re not an insect, my dear.” My upper arm was taken in an firm grip and I put on my feet. The whole thing happened so provident and swift, I thought Palpatine would start to dust me gently the next moment. Yet the cowl of the black cloak revealed only the lower half of the face, indicating he was here in his incarnation as Sidious.

“You were faster than I expected. I'm sorry, since I had to meditate, I can only ease the last part of your way.” With that he laid an arm around me and jumped. Soft like a feather we landed on the flat top of the ridge in front of another thicket. My hearth throbbed. Not due to the excitement of the flight, but because of the rock-climbing. “Meditate,” I snorted when I recovered my breath.

“On the sound of destruction.” The marrow-eating cold which I had felt earlier, came back for a fleeting moment, making me gasp. Sidious let hear a soft chuckle. Suddenly he raised his head. I got the glimpse of a blazing yellow eye. “Keep him entertained.” With a backward somersault the Sith Lord vanished between the line of trees thirty yards away. That is the problem with civilians, no sense for clear orders...

From beyond the rim sounded the notorious noise of a jet-pack. I backed up toward the woods. The bulky form of Chief Oak appeared, very distinct by his beautifully armour even if his face was now masked with a helmet. His right held the hilt I had noticed earlier in the tent. It was not longer empty. The blade had come to life in black light fringed by little, mean-looking flashes of white. I could not tell from experience how vintage to modern lightsabres compared, but anyway a blaster would have been very handy right now. Instead I had my orders. I waved to draw Oak's attention.

How steepened in Mandalorian culture the Chief was, told the line of curses coming from his helmet's speaker when he noticed me. For his savvy spoke, that he had made the connection between me and Maul's appearance. Against it, that he landed and in the landing attacked immediately, instead to fly over and herd me toward the cliff.

I dived under his first blow. Only to learn how stupid that was, when the second hit the ground so close to my ear, I could not discern if it was the plasma of the blade or the stone molten by it, what seared my skin. Blindly groping I rolled over the jagged rock, faster and faster, hunted by a sizzling sabre with equally increasing speed. What I had collected of dirt during the flight was scraped off. But it was put back twice, when I did fall into a shallow dip, full of dead leaves and twigs. I gave Oak a handful of that stuff.

He was taken by this trick, firing his jet-pack to make an evasive pirouette in the air. That bought me the time to be back on my feet. When the Chief realised I had no explosive or knife thrown at him, he roared an exceptionally beautiful expletive and pointed the muzzle of the cannon on his left forearm at me. I cartwheeled into Chief's direction - the grenade touched ground in my back, the explosion shoving me into the shallow dip I had visited before. I handed Chief Oak again some of the debris.

He still did not like it. But for a diversion he cursed his empty launcher instead me while engaging on foot. I sidestepped the black blade bearing down on me, aiming a fist at one of the weaker parts of the Mandalorian armour in the pit of his sword arm. This move earned me not much aside bruised knuckles and vexed Oak like the debris had. I had to do some more Trandoshan lizard dance.

It wasn't a waltz. During the fast reel the black sabre was playing, half the time from a jet-pack enhanced hight and the other half from the ground, I was able to pitch when and then a kick or a hit. Eventually, in one lucky moment, when he didn't expect it, I changed tactics with seizing one of Oak's legs. A sharp pull and his excess weight did the rest. The imbalanced Chief hit the ground hard. But not without kicking me midships.

Oak and I were up simultaneously, but Oak not distracted by pain. The black lightsabre screamed through the air, meant to split me from head to toe. It was too late to run. Only thing I could do was clapping my gloved hands to catch it like a tasty mmhmm. The laser streak hummed angry, titillating my palms protected by the Force absorbing cortosis. It smelled of ozone and burnt dirt and I was at my wit's end. But I was not the only one. Oak just stood at arms length from me and tugged stupidly on his weapon instead exploiting my precarious position. A mad giggle build in my throat.

As if called to solve this draw, two Sith Lords suddenly somersaulted as two clouds of darkness right and left from me out of the briar, lightsabres ignited. I saw where the two red plasma beams crossed as they cut through the Mandalorian when landing on their feet. Then I stumbled back, bereft of the balancing counter power at the other side of the black sabre.

This moment a blaster bolt sailed weakly past us, deflected by Maul's blade. From beyond the rim of the bluff Pre Vizsla rose. Somewhere he must have lost his helmet. Strands of wet blond hair stuck on his forehead, smoke had blackened his face and there were some bruises. Yet his handsome, small mouth was a firm, resolute line and the blue of his eyes bright, even in the daylight. A lightsabre had grazed over the front of his armour rendering most of its ingenious implements useless. The blaster in his hands clicked several times empty.

Moving swift and not leaving Pre out of my eyes I grabbed the still humming black sabre from where it had fallen. But he was as fast, holding suddenly some throw-stars in his hand. I gripped the hilt harder, not sure how to parry those. Pre made one step, then two in our direction, limping ungainly. Another step and he collapsed. The stars spilled on the ground.

“Enough. Leave him.” Maul's gloved hand was on my wrist.

“He's just here for this.” Sidious fingers touched the activator button and the humming in my hand chased. “His ancestors took it from the Jedi. However we're not the Temple's lost property office.”

From his prone position Pre looked up, no fear in his deep blue eyes. Not even pain. He crawled closer until he reached Oak's corpse. For a moment he stopped, laying a hand flat on his chiefs body. After another moment he turned his head, staring longingly at the hilt in my hand.

I bend and proffered it him. With a sigh Pre grabbed the hilt, activated his jet-pack and flew, back first, downhill. A couple of fast steps and I was at the cliff. Just two feet below on a ledge the rock was stained with blood and burn-marks from a jet-pack. As if someone had waited there until his chief was finished off. When I looked up, the descending Mandalorian was already swallowed by the plume of smoke over the burning settlement. But I thought I could still see his blue eyes.

There was a motion in my back and when I turned, Sidious had whirled on his heels, now filtered through the threes. The lad and I followed slowly.

The coppice was smaller than I had thought. Soon I saw a dingy from the senatorial shuttle squatting on the short grass of a highland savannah. “By the way, what's up with Dooku?”

Maul replied: “He's on Kamino.”

Sidious stopped abruptly, but did not care to face us: “I've seen a not too disappointing demonstration of silent Dun Möch today. I must have missed the moment you arrived at the decision to teach that art.”

“I suddenly remembered a line from your late master --- to teach is to learn.” Maul and I had now reached Sidious who turned slowly: “Indeed. I had to suppress any thought of a weapon nonetheless.”

Realisation hit like a pulse-wave. The exhaustion, the spot on my arm where the blaster bolt had grazed, the echo of Chief Oak's boot in my stomach and the presence of my fan with blades. Now I **too** had to suppress any thought of reaching for a weapon.

Darth Sidious eyes glittered in the shadow of his hood. He seemed to grow when squaring his shoulders: “You have been late, Apprentice.”

“I checked the holonet news before I destroyed the transmission units of the Kom'rk. I thought it a sensible addition to your plan --- Master.” 

“And I thought you're just fond of Pre Vizsla.”

The two men regarded each other wordless like they had done in Coruscant ever so often. Yet this time the ingredient of mutual understanding seemed to be absent. I said into the brooding silence: “I too had expected you earlier.”

“I'm sorry to hear that,” responded Sidious still staring at Maul.

Maul lifted his hand, palms open: “There was an attempt on the Supreme Chancellor's life.”

The Sith Master showed his teeth in an ugly little smile.

“Then we'll go back to Coruscant?” I asked recalling what was on the schedule after the stay a Empress Teta. An economic summit or a political gathering or something like that in the Outer Rim...

“No. We go to Eriadu. The attempt was unsuccessful.” It was Sidious' angry hand what removed the cowl. But it was Palpatine's face the falling fabric revealed, frozen midway between genuine relieve and painful embarrassment: “That I had to be away on a fitness retreat when such a terrible accident happened to my good friend Valorum ---” Such stellar performance. Wasted on a crowd he owned already.


	7. Chapter 7

I stubbed my zig in the puddle seeping from the remains of a lomin's ale thick and sweet foam. There was already a neat heap of older stubs in my beer goblet.

From a sitting area in the corner of the room, of the 'Blue Salon' of his senatorial shuttle, Palpatine's voice came: “Oh, really? A girl, Armand? Isn't that wonderful! Did you and your wife choose a name for her already? And how is your wife? It's her first pregnancy, am I right?” Eagerly like a Kaminoan on decanting day he leaned towards the large holoprojector.

Maul, standing at the side of Palpatines chair, moved no muscle in his black and red tattooed face at this show of emotions. The opaque image of the tall and heavyset human in the uniform of a Republic official in front of the two beamed proud at the barrage of questions before he got down to systematically answer them: “I thought Ysanne would be nice. My wife, well ---”

I fingered for another zig, forgoing the beer since my system had not reached a final verdict about alcohol. The sole other alternative to kill time and not doing the senator's paperwork was watching my bruises heal, which they did quite fast. Not as speedy as Maul's though. But Pre with the blue eyes would be much longer a convalescent. 

The door of the salon opened to let Sate Pestage in. He stopped, but didn't try to draw the attention of his superior. Instead Sate's gaze lingered for a moment on Maul, then he walked over to where I leaned at the salon's wet bar. “Gee, the gymnastics teacher.” That was drawled soft enough not to disturb the holoconference at the other end of the room.

Judged by his grin he was really happy to see me. “Aide Pestage,” I returned the flash of bright, shiny teeth, “didn't notice your ship docking.”

“You were occupied.” Sate nodded towards the stub-filled beer goblet at my side. Still grinning he opened the wet bar's cooler. “Such holocall can drag. Want a fresh one?” When I declined he took just one bottle and installed himself comfortably at my side. Palpatine was still discussing the joys and perils of motherhood like a seasoned EW-3 midwife droid.

In time with my cigarette Sate had finished his ale. I lit me another one. “You may find that boring,” Sate suddenly said under his breath. “You're more for hand-to-hand combat,” he added, running the backside of his hand over my upper arm where a bacta patch covered the wound from the grazing shot incurred at Miners Moon. Our gazes met. I gave him the Eye. Not quite Maul style apparently, because Sate retracted his hand, yet his broad smile stayed. “What I mean, since we'll be together for the near future I better tell you how this is played. You may know a thing or two, but in this game you're green. This game is played more subtle.” Warming to his own words Sate gestured with the empty bottle. “As member of the Senator's entourage you'll appear on the screen of --- activists. Other entourages, lobby groups and such. You might be an upstanding sort of character. Or just need a bit of persuasion. They wont sent somebody with a club after you. Rather --- ointment, you know?” He let that sink in a moment before he turned his head, watching me quizzically: “Did somebody already?”

I had not doubt, senator and aide were a team of top notch gamblers. However, there was a sideline in the part of Darth Sidious, reducing Sate Pestage to a mere pawn. Or was the Senator-and-Aide act the sideline? That issue called for spending a few more grey cells on it than I had unoccupied right now. Instead I considered briefly if been kidnapped by Chief Oak's militia might translate as an attempt of Ducal Mandaloria to make me favourably supporting its interest. Or if the dart in my side could have been meant as a plea of the witches of Dathomir for more recognition in the Galactic Republic senate. “No.” For a diversion it felt good not to have a need to shield your brain with Teräs Käsi even when speaking the truth.

Sate leered at the holo-projection over there, in the corner. “Will happen. It's always a matter of making you thankful for something. Or for nothing.”

As on a cue Palpatine exclaimed right now: “My dear Armand! Again I can not say how thankful I am you could help my aide.”

“Don't mention it.” The bluish hologram of the heavyset official bowed.

“Paper pusher,” muttered Sate. “In my cabin I got some really nice stuff. Mind to join?”

I too looked over to the corner where the talk had come to an end. Maul was standing now behind Palpatine's seat. A brilliantly lit torchiere close to him let his shadow fall heavy and dark over the senator. Palpatine wiped his hand in an overacted gesture of tiredness across his forehead before he reached for the holoprojector's remote to make another call.

* * *

Sate Pestage, as top-aide to Palpatine should have access to a personal cabin. But since Maul and I did inhabit it, one of the standard quarters with simple climate control and smaller stowage was assigned to him. I climbed carefully over unpacked luggage blocking its entrance area. Sate began immediately to rummage the bags for the 'fine stuff' he promised me. “Make yourself comfortable,” he said.

I sat down on the cot, removing boots and folding legs since we would end up on these sheets anyway, even if a Nabooian senator's aide would have been as concerned with decorum as a Kubaz. On a shelf close to the cot stood upright a datapad with the display of a broad river-valley. It could be on Naboo, but I doubted it. Not that is was my business why the first thing he did unpack was such a picture instead - let's say - that of his family. "Your homeworld?"

“Yes. Daplona River on Ciutric IV. And it's mine,” Sate said. “Wanted it and bought it.”

“Ciutric IV? That's far out ---”

“Outer Rim at the end of the Veragi Trade Route. At the better end.” He chuckled to a joke only he understood.

“But now you're on Coruscant. That's quite a way.”

“That's quite a way,” Sate agreed. “But my family is still there. Running things.”

Things were probably the land he had purchased. "Your wife?"

"Mostly my brothers."

Hiding behind the datapad sat another item on the shelf. A very small box, a diminutive version of ammo crates. Its cover was slightly ajar and in this gap it glittered metallic-green. That glitter was strangely familiar. But before I could peek into the box, Sate took his seat at my side, handing me a drink in a fist-sized, stumpy glass with a thick base. I had expected something more fancy, like a Troiken nebuliser perhaps. But the drink had the dignified colour of Dathomir amber and a flavour as bold as Sate's grin. “Nice, that you came along.” We clinked glasses and had a mouthful in silence.

I tried to remember of the pleasantries I had learned for the task regarding the shy Muun, Bar Feler. But this had been before Maul bettered me at Kamino. The words had left my memory like the serum my blood. That, or I was too occupied with recalling where I had seen a green-metallic glitter in the past. Before the silence grew awkward I responded: “I found the remark about ointment convincing”.

“Ointment, really ---,” Sate chuckled, his cheeks coloured. Then we kissed. Sate was quite skilled, and not just because he managed to hold his glass the whole time without spilling a drop. He had to put it aside when we undressed eventually and engaged in the hand-to-hand combat he had suggested earlier.

It took not long and Sate panted in short, hard gasps against the back of my neck, the work as an aide obviously teaching superior time management. "I like soldiers. They're always prepared." He grabbed the beskar-shackles I wore as a bracelet around my wrist. Whatever twist or turn he had in mind for our gymnastic exercise, I now had an inkling what metal might have a greenish appearance. Now it was the moment to pull a trick I learned from a Poss'Nomin wore. Or rather Longshot had in a time when our batch was so broke, we did steal the food from donation plates of blind Tangrene elders.

The shifting of limbs worked like throwing a lever. Sate was neatly trussed up and secured to the guard-rail above the cot before his cock knew. But adapting fast, he tore playfully at the shackles, arranging himself more enticingly. “I like soldiers.” The moan was accompanied by a expectant gaze.

Ignoring him I rose on my knees to get and open the diminutive ammo box. There it was. A dart. Metal with greenish hue, simple design, no composite. I lifted it, but was not able to discern from its weight if it was loaded or not. Sate stirred again. There was still expectation in his gaze, but under it something else.

I sat down, leaning comfortably on Sate's lanky frame and pressed the tip against the soft but stubbly skin of his neck, just under the chin. Sate wetted his lips, not daring to gulp. I moved the dart slowly down, over the breast bone, the belly, toward the abdomen. Firm, but without breaking the skin. Before I stopped in the trail of hair leading to his groin Sate had found his voice: “What is this? It's not mine! I don't know who had these quarters before me!”

“Oh?”

"Damn, take it away. I don't know where it comes from."

The anger about me don't seeing it could be real. He was not more hairy than to expect from a human male in his prime. But for a smooth-skinned Zabrak it must be excess. I rose, dressed and pocketed the dart with its box. Any minute longer and I would have been tempted to make him confess he was a Jedi's son, conceived by the Force.

“But you can't leave me here!” Sate dragged hard at the handcuffs. I could. However, I seized the occasion to take a shower before.

* * *

Since not much time had passed, I was sure Maul and Palpatine would still be at the ship's salon. To watch them had not lost its appeal compared to sitting over papers. On my way back I did not made a point in hiding before the crew. Perhaps one would check on the senator's aide.

Inside the 'Blue Salon' not much had changed. Except that the holoprojection now showed an insectoid instead a humanoid. I remembered Sidious mentioning to sell the guys from the Colicoide Creation Nest at Colla IV a plasma machine. But the deal seemed to have blown up like Sate's date with me.

“I don't think there is a misunderstanding. My colleague Alpentand and I are just here to inform you the Nest is not interested.” The sentence was translated by the projector in an immaculate Galactic Basic, strongly contrasting to the dark, baggy body, swaying softly on six sharp-pointed legs. Only the large, doleful eyes were not as outlandish as the rest of the insectoid's appearance.

Palpatine's face around his pointy nose was still all red-cheeked benevolence, but it looked like the plaster they call makeup at Naboo: “The gasificator's plans are unique ---”

“Like my colleague Volgende said. No interest.” Another Colicoide entered the range of the projector field and planted itself firmly at the first ones side. Now two pair of melancholic eyes were trained on Palpatine. “I see,” he responded. He took a deep breath, then waved his hands in a light, dismissive gesture: “Thank you anyway. Thank you, that you found the time to talk with me.” The hologram subsided without him touching the remote.

“I think it's enough for today. You should not overexert yourself, Master.” Maul sounded respectful and concerned. But not more than an Aqualish on the prospect of rain.

“Yes,” Palpatine agreed, “yes, I'll retire.” With a measured tread he crossed the room, not taking notice of me standing at the door or his apprentice following him. I fell in step aside Maul, we left the salon in direction of our cabin.

Once there, I was about to store the box from Sate's cabin in a secure place, but was intercepted by Maul's hand on my shoulder and a wordless proffered hand-sized holoprojector. 

“What is it?” I asked.

The lad flicked a thumb and in the holo-projector on his palm rose a little figure. Even before it spoke, I recognised the newly crowned Nabooian queen. “Dear Longpress Kahuna, I'm very glad to hear nothing bad did befall you.”

“When did that arrive here?”

Maul shrugged: “Not here. Kinman's inbox.”

“Nice of him to forward it to me.”

“He don't know it. I had him --- occupied --- when I got it.” Maul's grin was dirty and delighted.

Kinman Dorianna was consoling himself with Maul because Sate Pestage took up chasing me. And that was the price he had to pay. “Swell.” I reached and activated the hologram in Maul's hand again. She was beautiful. Not in the way the quaint royal ornate presented her. But in her bearings and the genuine air of her words. Like that sort of guiding star you spot from the cockpit and immediately know there will be soon a mild sun warming your skin - if you know what I mean. “Is it custom for royals to care for their senator's entourage?”

“Not to my knowledge,” admitted Maul, freeing his hand from my grip and pocketing the holo-device.

“A very self-reliant little star then ---”

“What?” Chuckled Maul. “Yeah, but Force-blind like you.”

Given that I had managed to wound him once with a knife, this might not be such a big deal as the boy thought...


	8. Chapter 8

Eriadu is by far not the most beautiful capital in the galaxy. But the most industrious one though. The first time you spot its reams of skyscrapers, you will get the impression their mass became at one point in the past so heavy, the earth did crack open and swallowed the buildings. You also may wonder, why one in the right set of mind want to dwell under a permanent thread of avalanches throwing sharp edged debris and dust from high cliffs down onto roofs and streets. But when you come closer, you realise, Eriadu has been deliberately build in the deep cut, protective valley of a large river, and by some ingenious measure, the rock and scree has been glued in place, leaving the city contained and save like in a duracrete box.

Our shuttle landed at one of Eriadu's high-sea space-ports. These artificial islands made of power plant ashes and garbage do testament that the resourcefulness and the economic sense of this planet's inhabitants is well-balanced. It was probably the same economic sense which let them name the capital after the whole planet. The space-port's size and layout differed not much from what I've seen in other places of the Outer Rim. The security level was raised however due to the summit, so we had to wait before disembark in the shadow of a big sign reading EI. Under this abbreviation for 'Eriadu Intersection' was set in much smaller letters 'Seswenna Sector Central'. Well, since the remapping of the Hydian Way nothing more than refurbished droids and some organic food was coming from the planet of Seswenna.

I had been ordered to go with Palatine's luggage and see it through customs under the pretence of taking care for some delicate fitness apparatuses. In the waiting area, a modernistic affair of steel and fairfaced concrete, mighty displays showed footage of the reception of the dignitaries by Lieutenant Governor Tarkin at another space-port. Mostly however they showed Lieutenant Governor Tarkin. I saw him with tidy grey uniform and clean-shaven face amongst bearded officers inspecting troops. When he uttered something, the officers took notes. I saw him also enjoying his bare-chested self and the company of a black-headed civilian in a speedboat. Later, in the docking bay of a big marine vessel, the civilian explained the boat's engine while Tarkin dabbed himself dry and bearded officers took notes. Just before the luggage was cleared, I learned, the Lieutenant Governor possessed aside a hard soldier's body and a keen interest in army and machines also a sure hand. He shot with a stunner for an excited group of academics a striped feline as big as a Bha'lir. It was probably as extinct too, given Eriadu's reputation for environment pollution. 

When the immigration officer, a young woman with elegantly plucked eyebrows and skilfully kajaled eyes under her headscarf, was about to hand me a datapad for signing, the comlink at my wrist flashed. I threw her an apologetic gaze, mumbling "Family ---", which she acknowledged with a curt nod. But she didn't step back to allow me any privacy.

The caller was Maul. "Wanted to hear you, smarty pants."

"And I tried to spot you in the crowd on the screens. Will the reception take much longer?" I turned, that the lad could take a gander at customs and the folk in the queue through the device's camera.

"I don't think so." In his voice was only the faintest trace of tension. "And ---" 

"What?"

**"Take care."**

"Take care ---," I repeated, momentarily overwhelmed by the sudden influx of mental images the trigger word released. When my bearings were back, Maul had terminated the connection. His timing was immaculate. A Neimoidian, hard behind me in the line at the desks, suddenly became the centre of a commotion. It looked almost like a group of Aleena clowns preparing for a trick when the handful of small figures in grey uniforms went in formation around a large, colourful one. Large and colourful as in over six foot wrapped in a long, festive garb of deep blue with an additional foot of headgear, and with fast blinking red eyes in a noseless, mottled green face with a downturned mouth. But I know now this was my target and what to do.

The immigration officer had not noticed my moment of absent-mindedness. She rubber-necked for her colleagues, growling: "I need your sign on this."

"Yes, Officer." I took the pad from her gloved hands. With a small, inconspicuous motion I draw closer to lean sideways at the smooth concrete slab of the barrier-like counter and continued regarding the Neimoidian. The male humanoid looked youngish and seemed to carry no luggage, not even a needle wrapper for emergencies with the embroidery on his cloak or headpiece. Neither did I, but that was because the boxes with the gym gear were subject of a Eriadu special treatment. The Neimoidian's stuttered attempts to explain himself were brought to an end with the order not to move and the dull shine on a couple of blaster barrels. "Finicky bunch."

My officer gripped the weapon hanging from a neck-strap in front of her and frowned at me.

"Neimoidians," I elaborated, mirroring her frown. "Always bringing their own food. This fungus looks like baradium in the scanners." I signed the datapad with a snappy flick of my wrist. Her gaze travelled pensively over to the cornered Neimoidian, then back to to me. I nodded: "Cousin of mine is with the Naboo Port Authority." Handing in the pad, I added warm: "Thank you, Officer. You have a smooth process here, I must say."

Now the face of the woman lit up as if I had flattered her personally. She picked at her headscarf: "Have a nice day, Lady." 

Not destroying the favourable impression I made with a mocked salute, I just smiled and left for the piers adjoining the terminal. Besides, a soft flowing, hooded and ankle long trevella dress isn't exactly military style.

In the connecting hallway I tried to make myself as unobtrusive as possible to the armed guards prowling the site. When an official, with the label Seswenna on his coverall and the biohazard sign on the container in his hand, passed me, I breathed a sigh of relief, because hopefully it wouldn't take much longer now.

Eventually the Neimoidian appeared. He headed for the gate to the subterranean bullet train. That meant he brought indeed nothing to claim from the luggage desk. I managed to pop up at his side in the lot of travellers waiting before the gate. "I think I owe you a lunch, Sir."

My target gave an undignified yelp and flinched to put some distance between the two of us, but failed because we stuck in a crowd. Close up he was not the gangly youth he appeared to be at customs', but a gawky bachelor. He was probably as old as Count Dooku. 

"The fungus," I suggested. 

The opening and closing rate of his eyes sky-rocketed. But I had to give him that, he collected himself fast: "At the moment I would rather like to have a lift than food. Daultay Dofine, Fourth Engineer of the Saak'ak. Neimoidian Trade Federation."

All his hs were missing and the vowels short. People from the Colonies can do that with Galactic Basic. But the accent was not hard enough to give switching to Duro a serious thought. "Longpress Kahuna of the Nabooian delegation, personal trainer to Senator Palpatine." I sketched a bow and tried to sound as casual as possible: "If you're in no particular hurry I could offer a place on our boat. We rented one for the senator's training equipment."

"I think," responded the Neimoidian after taking in the askant glances the security guarding the gate swept his non-human form with, "I think, I'm in no particular hurry."

We extracted ourselves from the queue. But before we could leave the building for the quayside we had to join another one at the next checkpoint. However, with remarkably little fumbling and searching the officer in charge retrieved on his datapad the form to sign for my chance acquaintanceship. I did not forget to ask for our vessel, despite as timely as all other information the number of the pier and such had emerged from the depths of my brain because of Maul's liberal usage of hypnosis. When passing the gate I saw the officer talk into his comlink from the corner of my eyes.

That far away from Eriadu the air was clear and clean, a steady breeze dispelling the tails of the brass-coloured haze blanketing the mainland at the horizon. And despite the breeze the sea was smooth, not worrying any of the moored vessels much. Dofine made a small noise of discomfort and yanked the protruding headpiece from his pate. In response to my bewildered gaze he ran a hand over his bald head: "That's the downside of not going with the bullet train but a low ceiling ekranoplan. I feel naked." His usually downturned mouth turned up into a horizontal line - the equivalent of an impish grin. 

What the engineer's seasoned eye had recognised as an ekranoplan looked like the love child of a boat and an aircraft like the Dark Wolfes of Sriluur where the love child of a canine and a scorpion. On a voluminous body with plate keel were attached two stumpy wings with floats underneath and, separated from the wings, propellers. The body ended in a high tail, which seemed almost to curl over its back.

Outside, at the cockpit's wall lolled the skipper. He wore a rakish tilted turban and a beard as thin as the cacti forests on Lan Barell after the Qieg took to mining. However he was young enough to expect a more serious growing in the next years and the boat looked as if it knew how to swim. The skipper extended no hand to help my aboard. He growled pointing with his chin at the Neimoidian: "I'm not used to surprises."

He must have learned that attitude together with the fake Hutt accent from holonet serials, so I answered in the same vein: "Afraid?" 

His cheeks flushed. He retrieved a bundle from a compartment in the dashboard. "For you. The boxes are aft."

"Thank you." I unwrapped the pair of blasters not before we were airborne - if you would call it flying to roar about a foot high over the surface of water and occasionally skimming the crest of a meddlesome wave. Daultay Dofine stared, the wink frequency of his eyes rising to dangerous levels but his mouth formed again the horizontal line. "I wish I had thought of such an arrangement with the fungus."

"My offer regarding the lunch still stands."

He had no opportunity to answer this, because suddenly the plane lost speed until its engines idled and we hit more or less smoothly the surface of the water. I unstrapped myself from the passenger seat to join the skipper in the front of the cockpit: "What is it?" 

"An emergency," he indicating at the sea ahead of us, slightly to the left.

There were some dark coloured dots and some light coloured items bobbing in the grey water. When the skipper let the plane's nose turn in direction of them, the dark dots bobbed harder and arms were raised, waving at us. I thought I even heard shouting. But the machine rattled too loud to be sure... I don't know what exactly made me suspicious. Perhaps the determination and efficiency the closest of the castaways suddenly developed to reach us, which reminded me so much of the lad. I readied my blasters, kicking open the cockpit door: "Get the engine up and yourself down!" 

"You're --- !" Yelled the skipper but was cut short when the swimmers opened fire. I didn't hold back with my opinion in this exchange and was able to score one or two before the ekranoplan veered off and speedily spinning propellers carried us away.

The skipper crouched white-faced under the dashboard, shards of glass strewn around him. Both hands clasping the wheel sure and strong though. "Put the glass on the bill. And what else you always wanted to improve but never could afford," I nodded at him. The skipper gave me ferocious grin. But a grin nonetheless. I reclaimed my seat. Without the windows it was fast becoming unpleasantly loud and cold. My target's red eyes bulged, their lower lids tittered and the corners of his mouth dropped deeper than the Infinity Gate. Otherwise he did not move. I didn't ask if he was okay.


	9. Chapter 9

Aside the new and uprising quarters, there is an old part of Eriadu though, far out on the sands of the Orrineswa delta. It doesn't benefit from the smog-removing draught in the narrow river-valley. It is befogged with a bitter air, tarnishing the copper-plated turrets and domes of the roofs. But for some sentimental whim, this quarter is kept in its ancient form. Which facilitates the unburdening of tourists' purses too.

That's where I went for lunch. I can't say the Neimoidian took me out, because he still was in the state of numbness the incident at sea had left him. It made it easy for me to transport and install him in a chair at the foyer of the Nabooian whereabouts until I had delivered the boxes with the fitness apparatuses to the senator's personnel. It made it harder to move the engineer afterwards. So hard, that for a moment I had been tempted to slump into one of the winged chairs too. But I didn't want to watch for an undetermined time the holonet's latest buzz about dubious business connections several members of the galactic senate seemed to hold. It needed no Sinitin's brain to figure out that this was the result of the final release of Sate Pestage's manipulated data after the successful test run with the bookkeeping service at Coruscant's Newport. My orders were to keep an eye on the target, and neither Maul nor Palpatine were present to specify that. In one of the pockets of Daultay's gown had turned up a travel guide with a mark at a restaurant's description.

Despite the smog the tavern smelled that strong of fish you could park a spaceship on it. "It is recommended by the Galactic Phrase Book & Travel Guide," said Daultay. Since this was the first line the Neimoidian spoke after alighting on Eriadu city I agreed: "'Gilessus' Cantina' sounds nice." I omitted to read aloud what was written next to the tavern's name to promote its business - septoid and rat free. The building harbouring this heaven of cleanliness was small. Just a wide archway at street-level and a row of three bayed windows in each of its four stories under the flat roof. Settling brickwork and wooden beams ageing not well made the house look like snaking up into the hazy sky like the cobbled road in front of it was winding for the next corner. But the house only leaned towards the support the walls of its equally small and leaning neighbours provided. 

Inside the archway two veiled women waited a small number of empty laminated tables and rickety seats supervised by a big screen displaying sports and the inevitable lieutenant governor. Hard to say if there had been a longer drought of patrons, or if it was bad business because of the trade summit, yet our outlandish appearance seemed to be a more than welcome diversion. The waitresses flocked to us, gushing fast and happy about Neimoidian headdresses, Nabooian couture, getting around on Eriadu and what not until a bearded head poked through the kitchen counter and yelled angry: "Gertybe! Malkerek!"

The addressed responded with soothing noises and a repeated "Gilessus!" which the cook and namesake of the cantina retorted with more yelling. This merry-go-round did not stop before two other guests appeared, a Jedi with a Padawan. The bearded head vanished like reeled in by an invisible fishing rod, the girls split off and said to both of our parties loud and sweetly with one voice: "Order please!"

Daultay Dofine raised a finger like a retired history teacher of the U of Timb: "Two glasses and two plates." To me, or rather to the empty air in front of him, he explained: "This cantina is famous for its only dish, 'red mud crab', as well as for its make of beer, which is served in a pitcher." He shut his mouth, lowered the finger and I realised he had quoted from the travel guide.

While waiting for our order to be prepared, I dared a second look at the other visitors. Both were human. The Jedi middle-aged, with long blonde tresses and a serene face. And the Padawan, a little girl, looked already as self-sufficient as her warden. Something was there, something well known, but had I really seen this face before? Or was it the introverted bearing bordering to listlessness what reminded me of another place, another time... of an eatery in Coruscant, when I still was with my batch... Whatever it was, I felt no particular urge to clear this matter up and maybe have us sharing the experiences we made so far with our new-found families. 

More guests appeared, no Eriaduans, all of them aliens, and in time with them our meal. The engineer had not exaggerated. Or rather, the travel guide had not. The unfiltered beer sported only a small crown of froth but a lovely golden shine and tasted refreshingly bitter. The mud crab was a delicious mess of hard shell and tender white meat in a generous load of a gravy, red and hot like straight from the lava pits of Mustafar.

After-effects of a shock can linger, yet not for long by the time you got something substantial inside. When both of us had made a visible dent into the pile of food and the pitcher was halfway down, it seemed the right moment to gauge how much Daultay was recovered: "Isn't engineering usually staying on the ship during shore leave?"

"Ah, yes," said the Neimoidian, wiping froth of beer from his mouth and sounding pretty back to normal. "But first officer, that is an older hive-brother of mine, said he wants 'Seswenna Mountain Salt'. I'm the one to purchase it."

He didn't need to say more. Assistant of an assistant of an assistant's assistant is the job for the runt of the litter. The last one, the one you can call names and crack joke about. The one you can make running errands for you, even cleaning the latrines. However, the organic condiment had a name as good as Serrian Salt. 

"But," added the Neimoidian, rising a crab leg like his finger before, "that's the best thing that could have happened to me. Because, if I had asked for shore leave to sightsee through Eriadu ---" He left the rest of his line pending with a shrug of blue clad shoulders.

That made me chuckle. "I see. Snatching an opportunity beats any sophisticated strategy."

Red orbs with quivering lids watched me over the rim of a beer glass: "You do carry peculiar sports equipment around. Does the senator practice target shouting? I mean, you appear to be quite comfortable with these things."

A lot of questions. And he didn't even know I had reloaded at the Nabooian lodging with bladed fan, cortosis gloves and two extra rounds of blaster cartridges. All covered by the velvety trevella cloth of my dress. "Military training does have some health benefits."

My evasive answer was not challenged. I doubt he really had heard it, because his blink frequency did not drop a notch. "Do you know why we only use droids as soldiers on our ships?"

"No," I admitted, trying to tread softly on Daultay's frayed nerves: "Why?"

The Neimoidian gave me a long, level look: "They don't steal." Then he took a big gulp of beer, which I, by that relived of a verbal comment, replied likewise.

Droids don't steal. But they do! Albeit not out of their own will, out of their own account. And soldiers of flesh and blood? Pictures of people marauding, each one a true replica of myself, appeared before my inner eye. Perhaps the stripping down of the clone-matrix had been thought to make us more similar to droids. Neither bad nor good, just obeying orders. Neither cool nor hot, just needing a command. If you are raised this way, stealing is as easy as breathing. Killing too. You won't notice the difference. 

A shadow fell over me. I looked up. It was Maul. Maul in a long black cloak, his eyes glittering golden in the darkness the hood did cast over his face. Everything in the room halted. The waitresses were turned to the screen, as was the bearded head in the kitchen counter and the gaze of the patrons. But the girl and her master had vanished as if they had been just a figment of my imagination.

Without bothering to take a seat or even to remove hood and gloves, the lad grabbed my beer: "Alcohol makes humans sentimental." He drained it and put the empty glass hard down on the table: "There was an attack on the Neimoidian delegation. Their droids turned against them in Seswenna Hall."

Daultay Dofine's tall frame sagged. 

"We have to get going, Captain Dofine." Maul threw some credits on the desk's red-stained laminate. I rose. But the Neimoidian moaned: "The salt ---"

Maul waved a hand and together with the bearded head two small, gaudy labelled boxes appeared in the kitchen counter. One of the women fetched them while the other one hurried from table to table, cashing up. "Two?" I asked. Daultay turned gingerly his head, as if he feared a fast motion would unhinge it. Looking accusingly at me he said: "One for my hive-brother. And one for me to sell. To cover my expenses."

We were the last to leave the tavern, I heard the energy barrier of the archway hissing to life in our back. Outside was still the smog, but the street scene had lost its casual air. Did the passers-by hurry to get home to watch the holonews? Or to check on their own droids, for signs of disobedience?

Maul's Bloodfin hoovered at the wall of the cantina under the 'no parking at any time' sign. I wondered how the boy would the three of us get away and where to. He however just waved his hands lightly in the same fashion he had conjured the salt, and the ex-engineer darted like an Arakyd missile across the street for the speeder of a delivery service, idling at the curb. The Neimoidian kick-started it, secured his headgear with one hand, came clear of street level and zoomed away between two aeruginous turrets. What must be the delivery man began to yell and run. Daultei Dofine was on his way to captain an orphaned ship. Yet no, he would be not completely alone. There was a skeleton crew of droids for sure. I should have offered myself as a replacement for the defective ones. I asked: "It were Bactoids, right?"

"Yeah, OOM security battle droids." With a throaty laugh Maul mounted his swoop: "Your marksmanship is bloody good, smarty pants. Almost needn't no change of clothes after the bath."

* * *

On the back of the lad's bike we cruised through fast emptying streets. First it were narrow and crocked ones, later, after entering the new quarters, they became straight and stately, albeit remaining narrow. Eventually we reached the enormous heap of drab stone in the shape of a stepped pyramid that is the Governor's Palace. Over the last half mile we had solely encountered an occasional security squad. Cased in heavy armour they shot past, broadcasting curfew orders. Eriadu was closed down. 

The boy reined in his machine and circled the forbidding building in search for access. Somewhere at its backside, by an unremarkable door with trash bins for a garde of honour, we stopped. That the boy had headed on purpose for this servants entrance became obvious, when the door was thrown open and a figure in a grey uniform gestured us urgently to come in. Behind it I spotted Kinman Dorianna. 

Kinman was the first to speak up: "Maul! You made it! I'm so glad." While the two held hands, I found myself reduced to the role of a parking valet, moving together with our porter Maul's speeder bike into a corner that it could not obstruct the escape route. Then we barred the door, using a couple of heavy crates to assist the electronic lock. The soldier thanked me. It had to be a soldier in the premises of a lieutenant governor, albeit the differences in his uniform compared with security or customs were minor. Eriadu, like Kamino, only knew one kind of armed force apparently. But that doesn't made me feel at home.

From a connecting door issued another trooper. Before it closed automatically, there was a glimpse of a whole sentry team, trying to fit weaponry and themselves into a storage space or rest-room or whatever the original designation of this tiny hole had been.

The second trooper lead us through a short corridor and up an equal short flight of stairs. At the stair-head a third comrade of the previous two took over to lead our way from there on. We soldiered through hallways, preferring stairs over elevators, turning this way and that, and came across piles of deactivated droids. It is amazing how many of those clankers can amass even in an average household. But I could see the idea of instant security in taking them out of service right now. 

Of our small group I covered the rear. The sentry moved fast while looking stubbornly straight ahead. And Kinman was trying to talk the lad's ear off. When I sidled closer, I could pick up the words plasma, Neimoidians and Naboo. Suddenly a bilious gaze from green eyes blazed at me. Maul reached out and swivelled Kinman's scowling face back with a firm hand. The aide rebounded in an instant, straightening his brown, silken strands, then whispering as twice as fast. I slowed down a step nonetheless. 

At a cross-way, the corridors were now carpeted and adorned with pieces of art, our guide stopped: "This is the level with the rooms assigned as shelter to the staffs of the delegates."

"Where's the Senator?" Growled the boy. Kinman Dorianna waved both his hands at the soldier.

Stony faced the soldier said: "This way," and took up again his loping stride.

We left the bonny corridors and descended back into the maze of basement hallways. However, by now we must be close to the centre of the ground plot of the pyramid. The soldier talked to someone over an intercom attached to his uniform. In a place were one side of the hallway was a plain stone wall and the other one made of some kind of metal we stopped again. Blast doors. And behind them a raid shelter. So I thought. Yet, when the wall moved with the complete silence of well-oiled machinery, I saw it was an airlock. On a type plate I discovered the Loronar Corp imprint.

Our guide handed us over to another sentry, who brought us by means of an elevator into a wide, elliptical room, two stories tall. The room's major axis was about 160 feet long, the minor one slightly over 80 feet. Yet my guess might have been off the mark by several foot, because the room was stuffed with folk like the Anoat Asteroid Belt with rubble. Which actually would have been a more befitting place to be than inside a building on an Outer Rim planet. We had entered the bridge of a medium-sized star cruiser.

The recycled air was humming with a nervous drone, half giddy, half belligerent. A great number of Eriaduan military, their faces as sober as their grey uniforms, cordoned off the bulkheads and dashboards to the countless delegates from all over the galaxy, who still wore the ornate robes for the Trade Summit, but now swarmed a spaceship's command centre. Someone must have decided to open the palace's cellars and regaling the shelter seekers to their hearts' content. The Eriaduan troopers however did hold the fort in the sight of dead sticks waved in flourishing gestures during animated talks, and Arconas licking slowly the salt off lye dough pastries, or Chevin trunks pushed greedily into goblets until the Daruvvian champagne spilled.

Our guide stayed with his comrades at the bulkhead and Kinman took over. In his wake we passed a thick plasteel tube which raised from the ground in one of the focal points of the oval. When it slowly sank down, I saw heads peaking out of the top of this elevator, and, above in the air, a gangway providing access to the facilities of the second level. The gangway and the upper floor were also full of people. In the other focal point of bridge sat a command post, complete with holoprojector and all. Towards that we waved our way through the huddle.

Our entrance had not went unnoticed. There were cheers hollered into our ears while we got chummily pawed on shoulders and backs, or proffered refreshments and company. If you have ever been on Genarius during The Festival when someone did tell the shipyards' workers the celebrations better ought to hurry up because of an incoming radiation storm, you might have an idea how the mood was. Maul went through all the attention with a most cheeky grin on a set of mottled teeth. I instead squared shoulders and adjusted my cowl, pulling it further down over the face. And missed when the lad suddenly halted. Jostles from intoxicated the delegates pushed me against him. I felt the tension of muscles ready to spring into action. Maul's lips curled in a sneer, but his eyes were closed as if he had to listen to a lone and tiny voice in this din. Glancing over the crowd I expected to spot a Jedi's brown robe. But the only outstanding thing was a single Neimoidian headdress, and that not even brown. Of course, the Jedi were out in the city, trying to cool down the situation.

"Dislike? What?" I whispered and put a hand on my lover's chest. 

Maul stirred, shaking me off. He rasped one of his hoarse laughs. "This becomes boring." A Gotal, a few steps ahead of us, reached with a pain filled groan for her head-cones and shed a clump of fur. In an instant the boy got himself in check. With a measured motion he removed the hood, standing tall, every inch the young and arrogant Zabrak servant of a senator and 'Head of Communication for Interplanetary Affairs'. Sharp and dangerous like a half drawn dagger. The audience approved with sporadic cheers. They did not know the blaster to your temple the lad really was.

Kinman Dorianna was already successful in locating Palpatine, directing him toward us while talking his superior the ear off like Maul before. Yet with the senator were also Sate and the lieutenant governor, shadowed by gaggle of high ranking brass. Tarkin's appearance turned our small group even more into the centre of interest for the delegates. Amidst the growing number of spectators Sate Pestage had only a perfunctory greeting for Maul and me before making the introductions. Tarkin shook the boy's hand, not mine, and examined the boy intently. I had never felt more invisible in my whole life, except those times I actively wanted it.

From the news footage at the the space-port I knew the lean frame, its ramrod-straight carriage, the exquisitely tailored uniform. However, the Lieutenant Governor, despite his shock of full, auburn hair, must be as old as Palpatine. He had a sharp blue gaze, so light, it was almost grey. I wondered if young Pre's radiant pair of eyes would turn this steely shade too with growing older and becoming harder with yourself and others. In contrast to that, Tarkin's beardless, angular face was delicately chiselled and sensitive. When he opened his thin lips, he produced the most exact pronunciation and spelling I heard in a long time: "So, that is the trainer you could not do without?"

The senator emerged from the spate of words his aide showered him with, chuckling good-natured: "Says one who stores a getaway frigate in his basement! But yes, Maul has certain qualities."

"It's a cruiser, my friend," informed Tarkin, allowing himself a tiny, forgiving smile.

Spreading his arms in a comically contrite gesture, Palpatine admitted: "I should know, Wilhuff. By the Force I should! Pestage, my aide, was so enthusiastic about it, he read me some chapters from what was your ship's technical declaration I believe."

"Perhaps he wants to join the Eriaduan Forces, Omar?" Suggested Tarkin in a perfect copy of the senator's droll tone.

Sate laughed duty bound, but tried to blend into the folk gathered around our group really fast.

Palpatine sighed: "I'm afraid he's over that stage in life." 

"Well, there is a younger one." The Lieutenant Governor pointed at Maul. "Wrestling? Shooting? Blades?" 

Palpatine in response cried: "Yes! Yes! And yes!" With each cry he bounced on his toes. Some Ortolan in the crowd picked up the word and turned it into a catching chant which spread like Geonosian brainworms from the ground to the upper level of the spaceship's bridge.

Unaffected by the rising levels of noise the lieutenant governor had circled Maul with slow strides, his arms half crossed in front, one crocked index supporting his chin. When he had finished the circle, he turned with an inviting smile to the group of bearded officers, which had followed him. "Gentlemen, any of you want a try?"

The addressed raised their notepad and stylus reinforced hands, their intent to want **not** clearer than their Basic. The tourism industry seemed to be a better teacher for languages than the military, with Wilhuff Tarkin a notable exception. 

"Well then wrestling it will be." With this Tarkin began to unbutton his uniform. Maul shed cloak and tunic on the helpful arms of Kinman. A hand seized my shoulder. It was Sate, dragging me into the circle of onlookers: "You're surplus." 

Together with the agitated shouting and whistling delegates we retreated further, widening the space around the two now barefooted and bare-chested men. I had a field day picking up new vocabulary for commenting on the boy's gorgeous, tattooed body. Tarkin, albeit not being a loose limbed youth any more, filled his breeches very well too. The holonet footage had not been tampered to make him look fitter than he actually was.

Out of nowhere soldiers appeared, securing the inner perimeter of the circle. Someone of Tarkin's entourage must have signalled them. Both fighters went into a low crouch, then jumping into action simultaneously. Any Gundark tribe matriarch would have approved the viciousness and agility of the attacks and counter-attacks in the unfolding grapple. The Eriaduan had the natural grace of a real sportsman who is used to showcase his virtues. His holds and levers were exactly applied and went for maximum effect. He was seasoned enough to evade the Zabrak's horns. Maul engaged equally hard and graceful. If he hold back, then only in tapping on the extra Force powers he possessed.

That missed not to impress the audience, who started to shove exited towards the battle. The soldiers linked arms, pushing us back. In the hassle I lost the sight of Kinman Dorianna and Palpatine, who were at the opposite side of the circle. When I glimpsed the aide again, he cleared the way for a lady with an artful wrought bun of straight, dark hair. The two went for Palpatine. She latched herself immediately onto the senator, talking fast, her slanted eyes wide in the pale oval of her face. Sate at my side had not missed the scene. He spat on the ground: "Sai Taria is applying for a new position."

Perhaps Sate was right, because Palpatine not only patted the lady's slender hand, but hold it. For me the Supreme Chancellor's aide - no one else she was, I recognised her now from the holonews - for me she appeared like the people in the Temple's Halls of Healing on open day, asking for help for a close relative. But before I could ponder if the unsuccessful assault on the Supreme Chancellor had been not so unsuccessful after all or if Finis Valorum's had been named in the list of dubious politicians at the holonet, Palpatine released Taria. He raised his chin as if he wanted to overlook the masses of people in the star cruiser's command centre. His pleasant baritone carried easily through the noise: "Master Jedi, I'm glad to see you! It's over now I presume. So we can reactivate the droids."

The wrestling match was suddenly over too. Limbs, light and black-red, entangled one moment and the next Maul's shoulders, almost lovingly, pressed to the ground by Tarkin. At my side Sate, oblivious of the brown robes sweeping in, chuckled titillated: "He knows how to entertain the brass. They will carry him into the Senate Rotunda on their shields." I was pretty certain, he didn't mean the apprentice, but the master.

**Author's Note:**

> First published here.


End file.
